He's Got What I Want!
by Kate Manoso
Summary: A collection of one shots involving Steph and the merry men! I'm open to sugestions on my next MM to use.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: JE owns the characters in this one shot!

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I had been craving it all week and he was holding it in my face like it was nothing. I looked into his soft, brown eyes and glared at him. He smiled down at me and wiggled it in my face some more. I licked my lips and he started laughing. It was a rich, deep laugh that I didn't get to hear very often.

"You're drooling," he whispered in a husky voice.

"You don't know how badly I want it," I whispered back. I could hear the hint of hysteria in my voice. He was taunting me and I was going insane. "I'm desperate. What do I had to do to get it? I'll do anything!"

"Anything?" he asked as he brought it closer to my mouth.

"Anything!" I shouted as my mouth started to water. I know that I licked my lips again, and I don't care. I needed it and he had the best that I have ever had. "I'm about to start begging."

"I think that I'd like to see that," he said with a smirk.

"Please. I really need it. Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease!"

"I don't know," he said as he eyed me. "Have you been a good girl?"

"I've been good," I said as I stared at what he had in his hand. "I've been really good at getting my skips this last month. I've been on time to my parents house for dinner. I've been doing side work for Ranger. You're killing me. Please. Just please give it to me."

He stepped closer to me and brought it up to my lips. I opened my mouth and stuck my tongue out to lip the tip. He quickly pulled back and smiled at me.

"You're teasing me!" I shouted.

"I can't help it," he said with a mischievous smile. "You make me do it. If I had the same expression on my face, you'd do the same thing."

"Just give it to me!" I shouted. That one small lick had sent my over the edge. I had to have it. Now!

"You want it?" he asked.

"You're killing me. You know how badly I want it. I've been talking about it all week. I'm not afraid of hurting you to get want I want," I said as I got off the bed and started walking towards him.

"Steph," he said as he started walking backwards. "Relax Honey."

He stumbled over one of his shoes and fell to the ground. I leaped at my chance and jumped on top of him as he laid on the floor. I leaned down on him as I lightly ran my fingers up his ribs and along his arms. I leaned a little further down and kissed him. I ran my tongue along his bottom lip, seeking entrance to his mouth. His lips parted and all of his resistance melted away as my tongue danced across his.

"You fight dirty, Steph," he whispered against my lips.

"Not as dirty as you do, Junior," I whispered back. "Now, give me my meatball sub."


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: JE owns the characters.

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He was tormenting me and he was thrilled about it. I had thoughts racing through my head about murdering him. Ranger may not be to happy about losing a man, but I wasn't happy about being put in this position. I silently cursed myself as I shifted in the chair.

"You're going to make me beg, aren't you?" I hissed through gritted teeth.

"That sounds like a pretty good idea," he said as his eyebrows danced.

I glared at the blonde haired, blue eyed man in front of me. Desperate times call for desperate measures. I gave a disgruntled sound and turned my head away from him. Two could play at this game. I shut my eyes as he moved into my line of vision and I heard him chuckle.

"This is insane!" I shouted at him as I opened my eyes. "How can you stand there and torture me like this?"

"You should know me by now. How could I resist?"

"How did I even get here?" I asked.

"You fell asleep while you were waiting for me outside my cubicle. You didn't even wake up when I started moving the chair towards the elevator. The guys could hardly keep themselves together when they saw me pushing you into the elevator," he mused.

"Oh, Jesus! The guys saw you?" I shouted. I was beside myself. How could they have stood there and not done a thing to stop him? I felt my temper start to rise as I thought about ways to get back at them. They were definitely going to pay.

"Steph?"

"What?" I shouted as I was brought out of the red that had clouded my vision.

"Remember that I hold the key to your release," he said as he flashed me a wicked smile.

"Don't think that just because I'm naked, and handcuffed to a chair, that I won't scream for help. Remember, Honey, you're naked too," I said with a satisfied smile.

"I can get dressed," he said with a mocking grin.

"Heeeellooo. Did you forget that all of the guys have already seen me naked? Remember our little adventure in the gym six weeks ago? It's nothing that they haven't seen before."

"How could I forget?" he said as he pulled the memory out for a moment. Then, he quickly cut his eyes to me. "You enjoyed it!"

"You knew what state I was in before you started pouring tequila down my throat," I said accusingly. "Besides, I wasn't the one that hit the wrong button."

"You knew where we were. I don't recall you telling me to stop."

"You were the one who started taking my clothes off."

"Again, You didn't tell me to stop."

"You enjoyed it more then I did, didn't you?" I shouted as my rage started to boil over.

"This isn't helping your situation," he said dryly.

"My situation?" I shouted. "You took off all of my clothes and cuffed me to a chair! Some people might take pity on _my situation_."

"Calm down, Steph. You don't want to have a stroke."

I sighed as I took in the sight of the naked man in front of me. Of course, he was right. All thoughts started drift out of my head as I remembered what he held in his hand. I'm not ashamed to admit that I licked my lips as I stared at his hands. I know that I have a one track mind. I heard him lightly chuckle and I really didn't care. He knew exactly what he was doing to me. I mentally cursed myself for being honest with him. I should have known that something like this would have come back to bite me in the ass.

"You mentioned something about begging."

"Oh, go blow yourself!" I shouted as my temper came back. "I'm not going to beg for it."

I watched as he ran his finger over the tip. I know that I started drooling as he walked over to me. He held out his finger to me and waited. I stared at it for a very brief moment before I opened my mouth and leaned forward. I slowly licked the full length of his finger and I moaned in the pleasure of the simple act.

"Jesus," he whispered as he slowly slid his finger out of my mouth.

I smiled as I watched him use the same finger to go back over the tip once again. I felt myself go wet and my nipples harden when his finger slid into my mouth. I closed my eyes and let out another moan as I swirled my tongue around his finger. I was lost in a small piece of heaven when I heard the cuffs hit the floor.

When I opened my eyes, I saw him staring down at me. His eyes had turned to little pools of slate. I knew, in that instant, that his plan of torture had backfired on him. I slowly stood up and ran my fingers lightly up his chest. Starting at his shoulder, I kissed my way towards his neck. He let out a soft moan when I hit the soft spot just above his collar bone.

"I win, Binkie," I whispered as I grabbed the bowl of cherry jelly, toped with whipped cream, out of his hands and walked away.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: JE owns the characters. Just incase any of you live under rocks, the song is Closer, by Nine Inch Nails.

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It's eight in the morning and I'm already huffing my way to my cubicle. Rodriguez is now number one on my shit list. He just bumped Joyce to number two and the Dick to number three. Imagine! He told me that his searches took priority over everyone else. Yeah right! With that type of attitude, he'll be lucky if I do them at all. 

Hmmmmm. PMS?

I froze just outside my cubicle. There was a piece of paper stuck to the monitor of my computer. I took one step back and quickly surveyed the opening to my cubicle. Four weeks ago, Lester booby trapped my cubicle. He left a note like the note on my monitor now. I was so distracted by the note, that I missed the trip wire and ended up having red, green, and orange dye packets explode at me from every direction. Mr. Alexander is still trying to get all of the dye out of my highlights. He wouldn't be all that impressed if I showed up with more dye in my hair.

I felt certain that it was safe to at least stand in the entrance to my cubicle. I scanned every inch of my little office. Nothing looked out of the ordinary other then the note.

"Babe."

I jumped at the sound of Ranger's voice. He tilted his head back and let out a bark of laughter when I pointed at the note.

"It's not funny. Do you remember what happened the last time I entered my cubicle and there was a note on my monitor?" I hissed.

"Yes. I made Lester pay for all of the damages."

"I'm being cautious."

"That note, that has you so freaked out, is from Ella. I saw her put it there."

"You're positive?" I asked as I eyed my cubicle.

"Yes."

I waved Ranger off as I walked into my cubicle and toed my chair back. One can never be too careful. Lord only knows what could have happened before Ella left. I pulled the note of the monitor as I powered up my computer.

_Stephanie,_

_I heard that you were doing really well. I'm so proud of you for taking charge of your life. I'm going to leave a little present for you in the fridge when I bring down lunch. Have a wonderful day!_

_Enjoy!_

_Ella_

I was starting to love Ella more then I loved my own mother. That's not a good sign. I shook my head to dislodge the thought and stared at the large stack of searches that had grown in my 'in' box over night. I sorted them all out into piles by the person that requested the search. Then, I put Rodriguez's on the very bottom and placed everyone else's on top of his. Pay backs are a bitch. He'll be lucky to get anything from me for a week.

I put in my ear buds from my ipod as I grabbed my first search. I do all of Tank's searches first. He found the secret way to get my attention. All of his search request folders have a little post-it note on top. Every post-it has a little drawing on it. Sometimes it's a goofy face; other times it's a bunny or flowers. I secretly horde all of them in a little space in the back of the bottom drawer of my desk. The really cute ones, I tack up on my cork board and refuse to divulge the creator. Tank would probably kill me if I ever told anyone.

I was brought out of my search zone when I was hit in the head with a paper ball. This was how the Merry Men communicated with me. It's my fault. I started it by throwing messages to Binkie. He's the closest person to me, therefore he was an easy target. Ram is the furthest away and I think that I get more from him then anyone else. He should have been a quarterback. I retrieved the ball off of the floor and unraveled it.

_Lunch time._

I quickly looked down at my watch. Noon! Cake! I shot out of my chair and sprinted across the office to the break room. I heard Ram ask where the fire was when I ran past him. I skidded to a halt in front of the fridge and flung open the door. I instantly fell to my knees.

There… on the top shelf… was one… empty plate… with chocolate cake… crumbs on it. I reached out my shaky hand and grabbed the piece of paper off of the plate. I took a deep breath and turned the paper over.

_Come and get a breath of fresh air._

I jumped up and ran past Lester. I sprinted across the office and hit the door to the stairwell. I ran up all six flights of stairs to the roof door. I flew out the door and stumbled onto the roof. I quickly scanned the roof top. I saw a paper taped to an air conditioner unit on the other side of the building. I ran to the unit and skidded across the gravel to a stop on my knees. I snatched the paper off of the unit and flipped it over.

_You're wasting time in a place where time stands still._

I jumped back up to my feet and started running back to the door that led to the stairs. I crumbled the paper up and threw it over my shoulder as I opened the door and started running back down the stairs. I took them two at a time as I went down the same six flights that I had just ran up.

I busted out of the stairwell and ran past Ranger. I glared at him over my shoulder for a brief second when I heard him chuckle. I ran into the control room and froze in the door way as I quickly looked around the room. I spotted the note taped to a monitor that was broken. I ran to the monitor and ripped the paper off. I saw a smear of chocolate icing on the bottom of the paper. I ignored the message and sat on the desk as I licked the paper. I moaned as my eyes rolled back in my head. I heard Tank softly chuckle next to me so I flipped him the bird without opening my eyes as I continued to lick the paper. I let out a sigh and opened my eyes to read the note.

_Sweat for me, Hot stuff!_

"Fuck!" I shouted right before I stood up and ran out of the control room.

I ran all the way to the gym. I was pissed as hell that _he_ was toying with me, but I couldn't help the smile that was plastered to my face. I was stunned when I was enveloped in blackness when I ran into the gym. I stopped in my tracks and waited for my heart rate and breathing to calm down. There wasn't a doubt in my mind that he was here. I could feel his presence. I was startled when the stereo, across the room, started playing music. It was just low enough that I could hear it, but not loud enough to drowned out everything. He was trying to confuse all of my senses. I focused on the music as I kept my breathing slow.

_You let me violate you. _

_You let me desecrate you._

_You let me penetrate you._

_You let me complicate you._

_Help me. I broke apart my insides._

_Help me. I've got no soul to sell._

_Help me. The only thing that works for me._

_Help me get away form myself_.

_I wanna fuck you like an animal._

_I wanna feel you from the inside._

_I wanna fuck you like an animal_.

_My whole existence is flawed._

_You get me closer to God._

That's when I smelled the cake. He was very close to me. In fact, he was right behind me. I could feel his body heat. The music, the smell of the cake, the blackness, and the feel of his body heat lit me on fire. I couldn't figure out if I was more desperate for him, or the cake. Frustration started to build and the cake was winning.

"I want my cake," I hissed.

His arm came around my waist and brought my back into his chest. I brought my hands around and grabbed the sides of his pants. I felt him grow hard as he started kissing my neck. I tightened my grip on his pants and pulled him closer as I slowly swayed my hips side to side along with the music.

"I'm a dead man," he whispered in my ear.

My heart skipped a beat when I heard the plate hit the floor. Both of his hands were instantly busy attacking my body. He was everywhere at once. I released his pants and turned around in his arms. His lips were on mine in a second. I ran my hands up his chest on their way to his thick hair. I was caught off guard by a band that was in his hair. I kissed him for everything that I was worth as I traced my fingers along the band.

New night vision goggles?

I got him lowered to the floor. He wasn't thinking as clearly as I was. As soon as I had him down, I ripped the goggles off and rolled out of his reach. I pulled them on and tightened the straps as I looked around the room. Awesome goggles! Light weight. Flexible. Very thin. I was able to quickly locate the cake, still on the plate. It was my lucky day. I scooped up the plate as I scrambled to get out of his reach as he started to crawl around on the floor. I ran over to the treadmills and watched as he gave up when he ran into a wall head first.

"Oh. My. God." I said around a mouthful of cake.

"Stephanie."

"This is so good," I said as I stuffed more into my mouth. "Did you have a chance to try a bite?"

"No."

"That's too bad, Cal," I said with a laugh as I took another bite while I watched my boyfriend flip me the bird.


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: JE owns the characters. If you get the chance go to Napster and find the song that I mention in this chapter. I'm totally in love with this song right now!

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Pulling a monitoring shift in the control room is like sticking long needles in my eyes. Nothing happens for eight hour. And I mean nothing. It's like everyone in Trenton knows that I'm in the control room and no one does any B & E that night. The worst part is that it's a fourteen day stretch of nothing. Yep! Fourteen days straight of night monitoring. Fourteen days that I have to spend with Ram, Lester, and Bobbie. Two in the control room and two out on the street. My fourteen nights are spent trapped in the control room while the guys rotate out. No one trusts me to go out.

Tonight, I'm with Lester in the control room. He can be my favorite person to be trapped in the control room with. He likes to make up little games. One of the stores that we monitor has a camera outside that also shows the main entrance to an adult store. I like to play repeat customer. We track how many people are regular customers and how often they come back.

We were in the middle of trying to figure out if this guy that was loitering outside the store was a regular when my boyfriend walked into the adult store. I almost had a heart attack as Lester started busting up laughing. I was completely mortified! What in the hell was he doing in there? He walked back out of the store a couple of minutes later and waved at the camera. He waved! Like he knew that we were watching! I looked around the room for something to hit Lester with. He was still laughing and it was really starting to piss me off. I settled for my stun gun and smiled when the room went silent as he slid out of his chair and hit the floor.

"Babe."

I whirled around to find Ranger leaning against the door frame. He gave me a half smile as he nodded his head.

"He asked for it," I said as I pointed at Lester.

"Don't make me take your stun gun away."

"It's my only line of defense against these guys."

"Apologize to him when he wakes up," Ranger said and then he disappeared.

I sat back down in my chair in front of the screens. I cut my eyes back to the screen that had previously held my attention. I saw one of my regulars head in and shook my head. What on Earth is my man up to now? He is as mysterious and patient as Batman. That's how he wore me down to go out with him in the first place. I'd find little things laying around that would, for one reason or another, remind me of him. Then, a few weeks later, the flowers and little gifts started showing up. He had managed to weave himself into every thought that ran through my mind. I found myself asking him out on a date. Yeah! Try to figure that one out.

I apologized to Lester when he woke up. He said that I owed him breakfast tomorrow. He had a feeling that I might not have time this morning to do breakfast. The bag that my man had in his hand when he walked out, was rather large. The size of the bag had piqued my interest at first. As the night wore on, it started to worry me. We had only been together for a few months. I thought that we didn't have any issues in the sex department. The man was incredible. He did things to my body that Ranger had never done, and Ranger had done a lot.

I guess I had been pretty lucky in that department since I left the Dick. Joe was pretty damn great. Short in the time department, but he made every minute count. Ranger had been explosively intense. Every one of the five encounters that I've had with him had taken over the list of my top five sexual experiences. Until I found _him._ The first time with him had blown Ranger out of the water. He held the same intensity as Ranger, but there was an under current of raw emotion. Like all of his walls had been striped away. That first night had me coming back for more every night since.

As the clock crept closer to six, I started to get nervous. The nervousness was quickly swept away by horror as a stray thought entered my mind. What if I was the problem? What if I wasn't good enough? Oh! My! God! What if I'm terrible in bed? Wait, that can't be it. I don't think that Ranger, or Joe, would have kept coming back for more if I was bad in the sack. This is driving me insane! What in the hell is in that bag?

"Probably a blow up doll and some porn," Lester said.

"What?" I asked as I looked over at him.

"You asked what was in the bag. I was assuming that you were thinking about what we saw earlier."

Damn It! I was thinking out loud again! I normally only do that when I'm stressed out. Great! Now I'm stressed out! Could this get any worse?

"How was your night?" Tank asked as he walked in.

"Do not say a word," I hissed at Lester as I glared at him and pointed at the stun gun in my lap.

"Last night was pretty quiet," Lester said as he inched away from me. "Nothing happened all night."

"Are you recovering from the stun alright, Lester?" Tank asked as he walked over to look at the monitors.

"Yep. Steph is going to make it up to me by buying me breakfast tomorrow morning."

"Next time you might want to hold the laughter in."

I glared over at Tank. How much did he know? How much did Ranger know?

"Only that you stunned Lester because he wouldn't stop laughing. We haven't figured out what he was laughing at though," Tank said with a grin.

"You won't," I said as I glared over at Lester and tapped my stun gun. "Lester's taking that little secret to his grave."

"Slow night," Bobbie said as he walked in with Ram.

"I don't care what anyone says. I'm taking Steph out on patrol with me tomorrow night," Ram said as he flopped down in the chair next to me.

"I'm game," I said as I smiled at Ram.

"Check with Ranger and her old man first," Tank muttered under his breath.

"I heard that," I growled as I stood up. "I can make my own decisions, ya know."

"You made your bed, Ram," Tank said as he waved his hands in surrender. "If you get shot tomorrow night, it'll be your own fault. Now, every body get out before I make you all pull doubles."

I took the hint and ran out of the control room. I took the stairs down to the fourth floor and ran to my apartment. I stopped short in front of my apartment door. I could hear music playing from inside. I smiled as I faintly heard him singing along with the song. _Kingdom_ by Dave Gahan. I leaned my head lightly against the door and sighed. He's an incredible man in every way. What did I do to deserve him?

I slowly opened the door and stepped inside. There were candles all over the room. I slowly shut the door as I took in the transformation that my room had gone through. He was standing in front of my bed. The only thing that he was wearing was a smile and funky red underwear. From where I was standing, they looked kind of waxy. He threw a small box at me and I almost didn't catch it. I was still in hormone over drive by the sight of him.

I looked down at the box. For a moment, I couldn't read. None of the words on the box made any sense. Then they started to settle in. I felt my tongue involuntarily run across my upper lip. _Cherry Flavored Edible Underwear! _I slowly looked back up at him. He had gotten closer and the smile had turned devilish.

"I got a pair for you, too," He whispered as he bent his head down to kiss me.

I broke the kiss in an effort to regain my breath. I whispered against his lips.

"Hand them over, Hal."


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer:JE owne the characters.

This one's for Junni357. Sorry for any spelling errors. The computer system at my work sucks and I had to get this one out.

* * *

"You're serious, aren't you?" I asked once the shock finally wore off. 

"Please," he begged.

"You need to run this by me again. You want me to do what?"

"Steph."

"I can't believe that you're actually asking me to do this. His birthday is in tomorrow! Why are you waiting until the last minute to drop this on me?" I asked as I slumped over in my chair.

"Because I knew that you would do it if I waited until the last minute," Bobbie said with a grin. "You already agreed to everything else."

I knew, at that moment, that Bobbie was right. If he would have asked me a week ago, I would have thrown myself down a flight of stairs, in hopes of breaking a bone, in order not to do this. Then, it really hit me, I'm in love. There's no other excuse for agreeing to do as Bobbie asked. I was going to put myself through torture for him. I would have told Bobbie to screw himself if it had been for anyone else. Even if it was at the last minute. _He_ was going to have to make it up to me for my birthday in three weeks.

"This blows," I asked with a sigh.

"Yep."

"You have to promise that it will just be RangeMan employees," I said as I shook my head in defeat.

"I promise, Steph," Bobbie beamed. "This is going to be the greated birthday party ever. Your appointment is at two."

I took the business card that Bobbie was holding out. I read the card and winced at the bottom line. I'm going to have to get very drunk this afternoon. I thought about that for a moment as I put the card in my back pocket.

"If I'm doing this, I need Vodka. Lots of Vodka. Plus, I'll need a ride to, and from, the appointment. Then, I need to know exactly how I'm supose to stay away from him until the party?"

"We got him talked into going out with us tonight. I'll take you to the appointment. I have Vodka in my apartment," Bobbie said as he started ushering me to the elevator. He effectively answered all of my questions, so I didn't put up a fight when he pushed me into the elevator. "We have two hours to get you hammered enough to do this. Have you eaten lately?"

"Yeah," I nodded as I walked out of the elevator and to his apartment door. "I had a burger and fries with Lula before I got here. You know that he gets horny when he's drunk, right?"

"All men do, Steph. We're gonna make sure that he's beyond drunk."

I started doing shots of Vodka has I sat at Bobbie's little kitchen table. He turned on the TV and we caught the last two innings of a baseball game. Sports Center popped on and I jumped on Bobbie to stop him from changing the channel.

"It's too late," I warned Bobbie. "I've already seen the opening of the show. I have to see the whole thing."

Bobbie let out a small sigh as he saddly shook his head for me. I had recently aquired an addiction to Sports Center. Don't ask how it happened, because I honestly don't understand it myself. Once I see the opening of the show, I can't walk away. I have to see the whole thing. Ranger believes that I've become infatuated with the guys behind the desk. That could be the case, I just don't have the time to see a shrink about it.

I drank my way through Sports Center. I was royally toasted when another baseball game came on. I waved my hands in surrender when I noticed that the once full bottle was now only one third full. If I had to take another shot, I would start puking. No one would want to go to my kind of appointment after puking their guts out.

Bobbie pulled me out of my chair and wrapped an arm around my waist to steady me. I stumbled out of the apartment and down the hall. I clearly heard music when I entered the elevator. It was Beonce singing about someone not being ready for her booty. I smiled up at Bobbie and started doing a little booty shake. He hand quickly came down to my hip as pressed me agianst himself, efficently stopping the dance.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm dancing to the music," I explained.

"What music, Steph?"

I pointed up at the ceiling. Bobbie looked up and then smiled down at me. I looked up and noticed that their weren't any speaker to play music. Shit! It was just in my head.

"You are deffinately trashed, Bomber."

Bobbie stuffed me into one of the Broncos and drove, rather slowly, to my appointment. He grabbed me out of the Bronco and carried me into the building. Evidently, he thought that I would bolt once realization set in. I, on the other hand, didn't mind being carried like a sack of potatoes. It gave me a chance to examine Bobbie's very perfect butt. Maybe I'm with the wrong Merry Man? I thought as I started to lightly run my fingers around the bottom of his cheeks.

"That's the alcohol talking, Steph. You know that you'd never leave him to be with me," Bobbie said with a laugh.

Bobbie kept me thrown over his sshoulder as he talked with the receptionist. She came into my line of vision and asked if I was sure that I wanted to do this. I just shook my head 'yes' and smiled. I signed something and then felt Bobbie start to walk again. I heard a female voice reasure Bobbie that they did this all of the time and that I'd be fine. That's when I pasted out.

I refused to open my eyes when I finally came around. I was in a bed. After smeeling the pillow, I realised that I was in my bed. I patted myself down and was relieved that I still had my clothes on. Wait a second! I smell frech fries!

"Bomber?" Lester whispered. "You finally awake?"

I could only moan because my tongue was stuck to the roof of my mouth. My head was killing me. I went to roll over and quickly changed my mind. My head wasn't the only thing that hurt. I held my hand out and felt a cup slip into in. I quickly scooted across the bed on my stomach and hung my face slightly over the edge. I quietly drank half of the coke as Lester chuckled. I decided that I could let that go for now.

I sat the cup on the floor and held out my hand again. A container of fries was quickly placed in my hand. I sat the container on the floor next to the coke and slowly started eating them. A hand came into my line of sight and placed two small pills on top on the coke lid. I placed the pills in my mouth and took another drink. I slowly sat up after I finished the fries.

"You look like hell, Bomber."

"You would too if you got as drunk as I did," I grumbled. "I need a shower."

I almost had a heart attack when I was in the shower. I had forgotten that Bobbie had actually gotten me to my appointment. I was a little red, but other then that, I was okay. The water actually felt amazing. I finally got out of the shower after Lester had popped his head in to tell me that I had been in there for an hour. THere was a small cream container sitting on the bathroom counter. The note under it was from Bobby. He said that i should use this if I noticed any redness.

I was dreading tomorrow, so I pulled on some sweat pants and popped in Ghostbusters. I needed something to take my mind off of the party. I gave up around eight and headed to the gym. I ran for an hour and then dragged myself back to my room. I passed out fully clothed on top of my bedding.

_

* * *

_

"I can't believe that you made all of this," I said in awe to Ella.

"I've learned how to cook a lot of different things since I started working for Ranger," Ella said as she smiled down at me. "I still can't believe that they talked you into this."

"It was my idea in the first place. That's why I took five shots of Vodka before I ran down here. I figure that I should be feeling pretty good here in a few minutes," I said as I smiled up at her.

"He just pulled in," Tank said over the intercom.

Ella made some last minutes adjustments and then kissed my cheek before she rolled the partition infront of me. I laid completely still as I waited for the door to open. I heard Lester Pull him in and say that he had to see this.

"What's up with the partition?" he asked Lester.

"Just wait for the rest of the guys," Lester said calmly.

"Where's Steph? I haven't seen her all day,"he asked.

"I just saw her a few minutes ago. She said that she had to run up to her room really quick" Lester said. "How's your head?"

"Play backs are a bitch, my friend. I was ready to kill Bobbie this morning."

I could tell that they were just on the other side of the partition. My stomach was starting to get queezy as the rest of the guys wondered into the room. They all told him happy birthday and patted him on the back. Cal was a couple of feet from my head telling Binkie a joke that almost made me lose it. I know that he was doing it on purpose.

"Will someone please tell me what the hell is going on?" he demanded.

The partition was quickly pulled back and I was in full view of every RangeMan employee in the Trenton office. His mouth fell open and his amber eyes locked with mine as the rest of the guys started whistling. I smiled at him and winked as Lester shut his mouth for him. The corners of his full lips started to twitch as he stepped closer.

"I can't believe you did this," he said as he knelt down by my head.

"You owe me big. I waxed for this," I said with self satisfaction. He doesn't need to know that I don't remember it, right? "My gift to you is that I'm a human sushi plate."

"You waxed for me?" he asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Everything," I answered with a devilish grin. "Brazillian."

"Are you naked under those leaves?" he whispered as he moved a little closer.

I slightly nodded my head 'yes'.

He whispered 'I love you' against my lips right before he kissed me senseless. I had to use all of my will power not to jump him at that very moment. I desperately wanted to run my fingers through his soft brown hair. I could feel myself start to ache to feel his hard body pressed against mine. But, I still had food strategicly placed all over my body. Plus, the little leaves weren't held down by anything. He slowly pulled back and beamed at me.

When I finally found my voice, I whispered, " Happy Birthday, Zero."


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer: JE owns the characters.

**

* * *

**

**His POV**

She really had no clue how beautiful she was. There were no words to describe how she effected me. It was all of the little things that had changed for me. I use to be able to make myself fall asleep on the ground the Congo. Now, I can't go anywhere near my bed without her by my side. My body wouldn't rest until I knew that she was safely tucked away in my arms. She had been with me every night for the last eighty-four days. Eighty-four of the best days of my life. I was completely undone by her.

Tank had gotten a call from Lula, while we were at Tiny's, one hundred nights ago. She had heard that Steph and Morelli had the fight to end all fights. Now, no one could find her. Lula was freaking out, so Tank told her that we would find her. I jumped on the phone and called Ram in the control room. He tracked her down and was able to locate her at some dive hotel off the freeway. The boss was out of town, so I volunteered to go get her.

She was a mess when I finally got to her. I had never seen her so trashed in my life. She was celebrating the fact that she had grown the balls to tell Morelli to fuck off. I told her that I was proud of her for taking control of her life, but that she wasn't safe at that hotel. I knew that she had given up her apartment and moved in with Morelli, and that there was no way that she would go back to living with her parents until she found another place. I grabbed her two duffle bags and carted her out to my truck. None of us would be able to get any sleep with her staying in that hell hole.

I did the only thing that I could do for her. I took her, and the rodent, to my apartment. I had a decent, two bedroom apartment three blocks from the office. Ram had just moved in his with his old lady, so I was in the market for a room mate anyway. Not that I'd actually let Steph pay for anything. She had past out on the drive to my place and I took that opportunity to call Tank. He thought that I had made the right decision in regards to taking Steph back to my apartment. Things had been a little rocky with Ranger lately and neither of us thought that she'd want to live in a RangeMan apartment.

It took me sixteen long nights to get her into my bed, where she belonged. I didn't even realize that I had wanted her until I heard her whisper my name as I carried her up the stairs to my apartment that night. She had snuggled into me and softly kissed my neck in the middle of whatever dream she was having. I almost came unglued right there on the stairs! She was soft and warm and she had just whispered my name in her sweet little voice.

That moment had changed my life forever. The ring that sat in my desk drawer at the office was going to change her life forever. Not in a bad, stay at home, Burg wife way. I loved that she drove me crazy with all of the nutty things that she'd get herself into. I can't imagine Steph barefoot and pregnant. If she wants to have one, I'm fine with that, but I can't see her tied to a house with a little monster wrapped around her leg. I didn't want the Burg life for her.

I've seen her change over the last few months. Leaving Morelli was the best thing for her to do. Not because it opened the door for me, but because she was free to do what it was that he never wanted her to do. She was the feisty Bombshell Bounty Hunter. The second night that she was living with me, she shouted that she hated her hair. I had told her, as I was about to walk out the door, that my clippers were in the bathroom under the sink. When I got home from work ten hours later, she had no hair. She was sitting on the couch in the living room smiling at me when I walked in. I almost didn't recognize her and I had unconsciously drawn my gun. Once I got myself pulled together, I realized how happy she was. Other little things started changing as well. She started running with me in the morning, no more doughnuts, and even target practice. She was getting to be a really good shooter.

Everything changed eighty-four nights ago. She had flown into the control room after getting a big skip and begged me to take her out to celebrate. She knew that I loved to go clubbing and asked me to take her out dancing. She had come to me. It was like a dream come true. I threw her over my shoulder and ran out of the room. I had just gotten off work and I didn't want to waste a second. I was in heaven all night as we danced for hours. She was so alive in my arms. I think that it might had been the last beer that I drank that gave me the courage to kiss her. I thank God everyday for that last beer.

So, on the morning of the eighty-fifth day, I find myself pulling away from a clients house. I had spent a hour there upgrading their system and checking all of the sensors. I was driving down the freeway, heading back to Haywood, when my cell rang. I checked the caller I.D. before I answered. The control room.

"Talk," I said when I answered my phone.

"Steph's Jeep just went off the grid. Her last know location was…"

I was already pulling of the freeway and heading to her last known location before I hung up on Lester. A smile twitched at the corner of my mouth when I saw the flashing lights in the distance. I knew that she was just fine before I could even see her. My 'Steph Radar' was that good. I pulled in behind a police cruiser and jumped out of the Bronco. The sight before me was a disaster of epic proportions. I found Steph standing next to her Jeep.

"It wasn't my fault," she shouted as I approached.

"Of course it wasn't," I said as I scanned the street for the nearest do-it-yourself car wash. "You want to tell me what happened?"

"Not really," she said on a deflated sigh.

I simply looked over at her and waited. I knew if I stood there long enough, she would cave. So, i stood there and looked at the love of my life. Her hair had grown out some and she currently liked to spike it out everywhere like a little pixy. Her hair was definately ruined. She was wearing a pair of black cargos, care of RangeMan, and a white tank top. Her cute little combat boots were peeking out from the bottom of her pants. She had looked exoticly dangerous when she left the apartment thismorning. Now... there just weren't any words.

"I was chasing after Diggery, again. Somehow, he ended up behind me and rammed me into the tanker so hard that the back end of the tank broke open and spilled onto the Jeep," she said quickly.

I smiled down at her and waited one more moment.

"It's maple syrup," she whispered with a small smile.

I walked over to her and bent down slightly to sniff her head. It was definitely maple syrup. I pulled back slowly and grinned down at her. Even covered in syrup, she was the most beautiful thing that I had ever seen. The top on the Jeep had been removed and she was covered head to toe in the sticky syrup. I watched as she slowly trailed her finger up her arm and then placed her finger in her mouth. I saw her eyes flash brightly at me. This definitely wasn't the best place to have sex.

I took her non-busy, sticky hand in mine and pulled her across the street to the car wash that I had spotted. She gave a disgruntled sound as I stood her in the middle of the bay. Music was playing out of a Camry that was being cleaned out about fifty feet away. I was about to pop some quarters in the when I saw her start to dance out of the corner of my eye. I slowly turned around to get a better look at what she was doing.

Her eyes were closed and she still had her finger in her mouth. Her hand fell away as she started to sing along with the song. I leaned against the wall to watch her. It was Pat Benatar singing We Belong. I knew that she had the moves to drive me insane, but I didn't know that she had the voice of an angel. I was hypnotized as I watched her hands glide over her body while she danced around the bay. She hadn't realized that she had drifted off into her own little world.

By the time the song ended, I was six inches from her. By the time the next song came on, I had her pinned to the wall with my hands fisted in her hair and my tongue down her throat. I thought that I was going to explode right there on the spot. The taste over her always drove me crazy. Add in the mixture of the maple syrup and I was ready for a straight jacket.

She moaned against my mouth when my right hand had trailed down her neck and captured her breast. I started grinding into her once she had brought both of her legs up around my waste. Everything melted away in my mind. She was the only thing on the planet. There wasn't a doubt in my mind that I belonged to this woman. I knew that she felt it in the kiss. I was desperate to have her and I let her feel everything that I felt. She exploded into a million pieces in my arms as she moaned against my lips and bucked her hips. I trailed kisses along her jaw and down her throat as she caught her breath.

I was brought out of our erotic encounter when Big Dig's voice erupted out of a bull horn.

"Don't make me arrest you two."

I looked over across the street to see about twenty of Trenton's finest looking our way. I felt Steph start to giggle as she buried her face in my chest. She slowly unwrapped her legs from around my waste. I reluctantly released her as I pulled away. I flashed her a smile before I turned back to the control box and popped the quarters in. I grabbed the nozzle off of the wall and turned back to her.

"I love you," I said quietly as I smiled down at her.

Her whole face lit up as she grinned at me. I had never told her that before. I could never find the right time to say it. I didn't think that there ever would be a right time when it came to her. She raced up to me and threw her arms around my neck as she started peppering my face with sticky kisses. She pulled back and looked into my eyes.

"I love you, too, Woody," she whispered to me.


	7. Chapter 7

Disclaimer: JE owns the characters. For the purpose of this chapter, LMT doesn't exist. This came to me while I was shopping at Wal-Mart.

* * *

My life has taken a 180 in the last year. The night that Scrogg shot Ranger in my apartment had changed me. I told Joe that I loved him. Later that night, I packed up all of my stuff and walked out on Joe. I couldn't stand there and love him while he couldn't completely love me. He wanted me to throw away the life that made me who I was. I _am_ the Bombshell Bounty Hunter.

I visited Ranger after he got out of the hospital. I told him my plans over cake. I wanted to be the best that I could be. I knew that I had good instincts, but I was physically in bad shape. I needed his help to get to where I was now. Ranger agreed that I had the right idea. He enlisted Hal's help to start training me. Ranger knew that Hal was my favorite out of all of the Merry men. He was a little bit more laid back and a lot less intimidating then the rest of the guys.

Two weeks ago, Ranger handed me a file off of his desk. He said that one of his Ranger buddies was missing. Ranger was desperate to find is friend and every lead that they had turned into a dead end. Binkie had said that there would be no way that I could find Jack Malone if he didn't want to be found.

That's when the bets started flying. I ended up making a bet of my own. Binkie over heard the bet and saw us shake hands on it. Binkie quickly turned around and bet Brett five hundred dollars that I would find Malone. I found Malone two days ago. He was shacked up with some show girl in Vegas. I jumped on a plane with Ranger yesterday and dropped in on Malone to make sure that he was okay. Binkie is now five hundred dollars richer, and _he_ now has to follow through with his end of the bet.

"Do you hate me?"

"Of course not," I said as I smiled up at him.

"Then why are you making me follow through with this?" he asked as he pouted.

"You should have thought about this before we shook on the bet."

"I still can't believe this."

"You're just mad because I won," I chided as I zipped him up. "Nice hair, by the way."

"Sally dropped it off," he growled.

"You can thank Binkie on that one," I said with a laugh. I looked up at his sour face. "I, for one, am proud of myself. I thought that you would be, too."

His face softened as he reached his hand up to tuck a stray curl behind my ear. A slow smile spread across his lips as he leaned down to kiss me. His kisses always started off light, like he was afraid that he would break me. I reached up and cupped his face as I pulled him deeper into the kiss. He brought his arms around me and pulled me closer. A wave of heat rolled through my body as I felt him harden against my stomach. I quickly found myself pinned to the floor as his passion took over. I'm not sure where my pants went. Frankly, the moment he slid in, I didn't really care. He took me, right there on the bathroom floor, to heaven. We both raced toward our climax and fell over the edge together.

"That doesn't get you off the hook," I said when I finally found my voice.

"I had to try," he whispered into my neck.

"We're still going to the Halloween party. You aren't getting out of this," I said with a laugh as I pushed him off. "I still need to get into my costume."

I got up off of the floor and pulled my costume out of the closet. I smiled at the Batgirl costume that Ram had found at a costume store and bought for me. It was the perfect costume. Ranger was going to laugh his butt off at my out fit. I still like to think of him as Batman. I pulled on my costume and helped him finish getting ready.

His hand tightened on mine as we rode the elevator up one floor. I smiled up at him and gave him a wink. He was wearing a blonde wig that had long, curly hair. I found him a black, baby-doll dress that had spaghetti straps at Macy's in his size. The shoes had been a bit harder to find. I finally had found the perfect pair of black FMPs at a specialty store in the mall. I added make-up and a little bit of jewelry to finish off his costume. I had to admit, he made the perfect drag queen.

The whole room erupted into hoots and hollers as we entered the break room. Several of the guys had propositioned him throughout the night. Someone had even tucked a fifty into his fake boobs. He had taken everything in stride. It was now my turn to bet proud of him for going through all of the embarrassment of walking around in drag for a whole night.

I was grabbing another beer out of one of the coolers when he caught me by surprise by grabbing my ass. I turned around and gave him a saucy smile as I reached around and pinched his rock hard ass. He slipped his arms around my waist and pulled me closer for a kiss.

"How much do I owe?" I joked when he finally broke the kiss.

"That's a freebie, Darlin'," he said with a wink and a crooked smile.

"Better watch out, Steph," Ranger yelled from across the room. "He charged Tank a hundred bucks to spank him."

"Don't worry, Ranger," I shouted back with a smile. "I'm a regular. Lester knows I'm good for it."

The guys busted up laughing as Lester smiled down at me and swatted my ass.

"Please don't egg the guys on. It's bad enough that I'm going to be hearing about how good I look in a dress. I don't need them asking about credit lines for the rest of the night," Lester said as he smiled down at me.

"Just direct all inquiries to me," I said as I winked up at him. Then I grinned and said, "I'll be your pimp daddy, Bitch."


	8. Chapter 8

Disclaimer: JE owns the characters.

* * *

I took my suit jacket off and hung it on the back of the chair in my cubicle. That had been the worst meeting I had ever been forced to be in, I thought as I repositioned my weapons harness and sat in my chair. Only one thing could help after I called that stupid woman a 'Beverly Hills Bimbo'. I reached down and unlocked the bottom drawer to my desk. My mouth fell open as I stared at the empty spot in the bottom drawer. The Bag Is Gone! It had been there yesterday. I'm positive.

I took a few deep breaths to calm myself down. I closed my eyes to think. His face came clearly into focus in my mind. He was going to pay for this with his life. A mischievous smile spread across my lips as the theme song to Mission Impossible started playing in my head. I reached down and slid off my FMPs as I quietly slid my stun gun out of its holster.

I crouched down against the wall of my cubicle and peered out. I could hear everyone quietly chatting in their cubicles. No one was walking around. I took a deep breath and rolled across the floor and into Lester's cubicle a few feet away. I grinned up at him and placed my finger to my lips indicating to him to be quiet. He threw on a serious face as he slid out of his chair and crouched down next to me.

"What are you doing?" Lester asked in a whisper.

"I need you to do reconnaissance for me," I said as I flashed him a wicked grin. "I need positioning on enemy troops."

"Ten-four," Lester whispered.

I watched as he slowly stood up and walked out of his cubicle. He disappeared out of sight as I moved under his desk and pulled his chair in. He reappeared a few minutes later and sat down in his desk casually. A moment after that, he slipped a piece of paper under the desk to me. It was a diagram of the office and the location of all RangeMan employees. I took a moment to study in and then made my move.

I slid under Lester's cubicle wall and under Ram's desk. Ram was in the control room at the moment, so I knew that I had good cover. I silently moved his chair to the side and crawled out from under his desk. I squatted and leaned against his cubicle wall and peered out into the walk way. Everyone was still seated and going about their business.

I rolled across the walk way and into Vince's cubicle. I scared him and he pulled his gun on me. I smiled down the barrel of his gun and winked at him. His body started to shake with laughter and I threw myself on him as placed my hand over his mouth. He was about to blow my cover. Once Vince started laughing, he wouldn't be able to stop. I did the only thing that I could. I felt bad when Vince's body tensed and then slumped over. I didn't like stunning the Merry Men, but I really had no choice.

I shimmied under Vince's desk and crawled under the cubicle wall. I grabbed Brett's leg and pulled myself the rest of the way through. He passed my a note under the desk along with a pen.

_What are you doing, Steph?_

_I need you to do recon. Positioning of enemy troops is needed._

I passed the note back up. A moment later, Brett pushed his chair back and left his cubicle. He returned a few minutes later and sat back down. I heard him scribbling quickly and then he passed a paper down to me. I quickly looked over the diagram that he drew me. I almost lost it when I saw that Vince was still down. Casualties of war. He was a good soldier and I will miss him dearly.

I nudged Brett over and crawled out from under his desk. I leaned against his cubicle wall and looked up at him. He looked out the door and then did some motioning with his hands. I looked at him with confusion clearly written across my face. He sighed quietly and then scribbled something on a piece of paper.

_I really need to teach you hand gestures if you plan on doing this again. I said that the walk way is clear._

I smiled back up at him and nodded. I slowly crept out of Brett's cubicle. My destination was the cubicle just east of Brett's. I could hear the enemy discussing surveillance. I peered into the cubicle and saw that he was on the phone. Damn! I'd have to wait until he was done. Until then, I couldn't risk exposure, so I crawled back into Brett's cubicle. I grabbed a pen off of Brett's desk and wrote him a quick note.

_Have I been detected?_

_No._

_Control?_

_No._

_You're a good soldier. Command will receive high praise for you assistance._

I saluted Brett and then moved out of his cubicle once again. I peered into the enemy's cubicle. He was silently working on paper work. The phone conversation was over and it was time for me to make my move. I reached out and tagged him with my stun gun. I watched him tense and then slump over. I quickly grabbed his hands and cuffed them behind the chair. I retreated back to Brett's cubicle and lifted his cuffs out of his back pocket. I saw his shoulders start to shake as I moved out of his area.

I use Brett's cuffs to secure my cuffs to the chair. I was confident the he wouldn't be able to escape the chair. I quietly started my search of the enemy's territory. After a few minutes of searching, I came up empty handed. He was the only one that knew about the bag. He was the only one that would have taken off with it, because we have the same weakness.

War was eminent. I heard him softly moan as he started to come around. I tagged him again with the stun gun. I needed more time to think. I had been certain that the bag would have been here. Plan 'B' was starting to take shape in my mind. I needed transport and cover. I slinked back into Brett's cubicle. I grabbed the pen and paper and scribbled a quick note.

_I need a distraction in the control room._

_Give me three minutes starting now._

Brett quickly moved out of his cubicle and I hit the button on the side of my watch to start the timer. I quickly moved back into enemy territory and waited as I looked at my watch. He shifted and I didn't hesitate to stun him once more. At the three minute mark, I pushed his chair out of his cubicle and down the back wall of the office. I had moved, undetected, to the elevator. I was in luck and the doors opened to an empty elevator as soon as I hit the button. It was a quick trip down one floor. I moved us over to the corner and peered out into the hall way when the doors opened. The hall way was empty and I silently moved us to his apartment door. I fished his keys out and opened the door. We were safely out of sight in moments. The enemy was now my captive.

I quickly moved the kitchen table and chairs against the wall and positioned the enemy under the small, one bulbed, chandelier. I ran around the apartment and turned off all of the lights. The enemy had a bad habit of leaving every light on. I walked back over to my captive and positioned myself straddling his lap. I patiently waited for him to come around. I swept a stay, dark brown lock of hair off of his forehead. I sadly shook my head because I knew that I was doomed to love the enemy. We had been dancing around each other for weeks testing waters.

"Where's the bag?" I inquired when his eyes fluttered open.

I watched him survey the room and then bring his attention back to me. A small smile twitched at the corners of his beautiful lips. His brown eyes turned menacing for a brief moment..

"I don't know anything about a bag," he whispered as he pulled on his blank face.

"I know that you are in possession of the bag. Return it, and I promise that you will be released with no further punishment," I whispered back as I tried my hardest to duplicate his blank face.

"I don't know anything about a bag," he repeated. He was desperately trying to keep his blank face on, but I could see that his eyes were darkening. I sure sign that Plan 'B' was working.

I ground my hips against his crouch as I leaned forward. I nipped his chin and then started trailing kisses along his jaw up to his ear. I heard his breath hitch as I slid my tongue along the shell of his ear. Heat raced through my body as I felt his stir beneath me. I reached for the CD player remote on the table behind him and hit play. Justin's voice came out of the speakers that were strategically placed throughout the apartment.

_Future. Sex. Love. Sound._

_You know what you want._

_And that makes you just like me._

_See everybody says you're hot baby._

_But can you make it hot for me?_

I started grinding my hips into his as I kissed my way down his neck. That's when I heard the faint crinkle. He had the bag on his person. I can fight just as dirty as he does. I continued the assault on my captive. I ran my hands down his chest to his belt buckle and started to unbuckle his pants. He started grinding against me as I captured his lips in mine. He was ready to go for the gold as I stuck my hand down his pants.

I momentarily stood up and wiggled his pants down to his knees. His breath hitched when I lowered myself back down onto his lap. I always teased him about going commando and I had done just that this morning. His kisses turned desperate as I started rubbing myself against him. He momentarily struggled with the cuffs that where restraining him, then he relaxed.

I tilted my hips slightly and took him inside myself. He growled as I started slowly moving up and down. I was now in over my head and I couldn't turn back. My need for him had taken control and the mission was in danger of being a failure. The first wave of my orgasm ripped through me and pushed all other thoughts out of my head. I shouted his name as I bucked on top of him. He moaned against my neck as I felt him spill inside of me. The sensation of his release triggered another orgasm to rip through my already sensative body.

I leaned against his chest and waited for the pleasure induced haze to clear as I caught my breath. The haze quickly lifted when I felt his chest rumble with laughter. I leaned back and smiled up at him.

"I won," he whispered and then leaned down and nipped my chin with his teeth.

"Hardly," I scoffed as I leaned back on his thighs. I reached down into his pants and pulled out the bag. "I still got what I came for."

"You knew?" he asked as an amazed expression crossed his face.

"Of course I knew," I said with a smile as I stood up and straightened out my skirt.

"Before, or after, you pulled my pants down?"

"Before," I said as I moved to the door.

"You aren't going to leave me here, are you?" he asked. I could hear the panic in his voice.

"You still have to pay for taking off with my bag," I said as I opened the door.

"Steph, you gotta let me go," he begged.

"Don't worry, Bobby. I'll send someone down to let you go," I said as I walked out the door. I looked over my shoulder at him before I walked away. "No one touches my Miniature Snickers and gets away with it."


	9. Chapter 9

Disclaimer: JE owns that characters.

I had a hard time coming up with this one. It's not like tha other ones, but kind of along the same lines. I hope that you enjoy. -Kate

* * *

"No." 

"What?"

"I said no."

"You're telling me that you won't do _this_ after you've done _everything _else?"

"That's right," I said to him.

"Stephanie."

"Don't 'Stephanie' me with that look!" I shouted. I could feel my temper starting to flare.

"What look?" he asked.

"That look that says 'Stephanie'."

"I have a look that says 'Stephanie'?"

"Yes," I said as I threw my arms up in the air.

"What does it look like?" he asked with a grin. He thinks that my temper tantrums are funny.

"It looks like you're looking at me like I'm retarded," I said with a glare. I know that my glares don't work on any of the Merry Men, but I'm still working on perfecting my technique.

"Don't glare at me."

"I'm not doing it!" I shouted as I waved my arms.

"It won't hurt," he said with a knowing smile.

"Are you kidding me? Of course it's going to hurt! I'm not stupid!" I shouted as I continued to wave my arms around. I'm not known for have a good grip on my temper and I was quickly losing it.

"Stephanie."

"Stop it!" I shouted. "I'm not doing it."

"Yes, you are."

"What? Are you going to force me?" I asked in open disbelief.

"Yes."

"Have you lost your mind?" I shouted as I started moving back.

"Some people think so since I've shacked up with you," he said with a mischievous grin as he started moving towards me.

"You've got to be joking?" I asked nervously as I continued to back away. "You're going to force me to do something against my will?"

"You'll thank me for it once we start," he said confidently.

"I can't believe this! You're my boyfriend. I thought that you were on my side," I said as I waved a finger at him. "I thought that we were partners. Equals."

"You know that I love you, Shorty."

"Then why are you going to force me to do this?" I asked as I ran into the wall behind me.

"I promise that you'll like it once we start. I'll be right behind you the whole way," he pleaded as he stepped closer and boxed me in.

I was like a deer caught in head lights. There was no where for me to ran. He was staring down at me with a huge grin because he knew that he had trapped me. I watched his eyes soften as he leaned down to me. I tilted my face up to look into his light brown eyes. He placed his left hand on the wall above my head and cupped the side of my face with his right hand. I smiled innocently up at him and he chuckled softly. We both knew that there wasn't anything innocent about me. He stared down at me for a moment and then sighed.

"You're going to be the death of me," he whispered. Then, he lowered his head the rest of the way and fused his lips to mine.

I felt heat start to pool in my stomach as I reached up and slipped my hands around his neck to pull him deeper into the kiss. The rest of the room spiraled away as need flooded my body. I heard him release a small moan as he brought his arms down around my waist. The fireworks where exploding in my head when he pulled me flush against his rock hard chest. I got wet the instant his tongue danced across mine. I felt him lift me off the ground and then slam me against the wall. I smiled against his lips as I wrapped my legs around his waist. He's the only one that's ever been ruff with me and I loved it. My breath hitched in my throat when I felt his hand run down my ribs and settle on my butt.

"Babe."

I reluctantly broke the kiss at the sound of Ranger's voice. I buried my face in his neck as I felt my face heat up. Ranger always has bad timing for the two of us. I peeked over his shoulder and saw Ranger smiling up at me. I gave him a little finger wave. Ranger chuckled as he walked away.

"Is he gone?" he whispered in my ear.

"Yeah," I whispered back.

"We've gotten off track," he said with a sigh as he unwrapped my legs and sat me back down on the ground.

"I'm still not doing it," I said as I turned to make my get away.

It was my turn to sigh as I felt myself being lifted in the air. He turned me around and started walking.

"I'm going to be right behind you. This won't hurt very much. If you really hate it, then we can stop," he whispered in my ear.

"How long?" I asked when he set me down.

"At least twenty minutes."

"Twenty minutes?" I squeaked.

He sighed and shook his head. "Fifteen."

I nodded my head and placed my hands on the bars to brace myself.

"Stephanie."

"What?" I asked as I looked over my shoulder at him.

"You're too tense."

"Will you just start so that we can get this over with?" I said with a glare.

"It's a treadmill, Stephanie."

"It's running, Tank."

* * *

I had a hard time with Tank because I don't veiw him as a Merry Man. He's Robin to Ranger's Batman. Plus, I can only see Tank with Lula. Thost two are meant for each other. But, no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn't leave him out of my quest to do one shots of Steph with all of the Merry Men. 


	10. Chapter 10

Disclaimer: JE owns the characters.

* * *

He shook his head at the sound of my cell phone ringing. I had found a ring tone of the opening theme song to the old Batman show with Adam West. When I found it, I had immediately down loaded it and assigned it to Ranger. I pulled my phone out of my pocket and flipped it open.

"Yo."

"Tank would like you to bring him a meatball sub from Pino's," Ranger said.

"Then I guess Tank should call me," I said and then hung up on Ranger.

"That wasn't very wise," my dinner companion said to me from the other side of the table.

"Just wait until you hear the ring tone that I gave Tank," I said as I held my phone high.

Moments later my phone chirped and then played a short sound bite.

_Holy rusted metal, Batman!_

He tilted his head back and let out a bark of laughter as I answered my phone.

"Hey, Tank," I said into my phone.

"What's he laughing at?" Tank inquired.

"Nothing. You want a meatball sub?"

"Please."

"I will if you quit watching me while I'm out on dates."

"Consider it done," Tank said and then hung up on me.

I chuckled as I put my phone back in my pocket and took a swig from the beer bottle that was sitting in front of me. I slouched down in the booth and smiled over at the man on the other side of the table. He was smiling at me as he pushed his dark brown hair out of his amber eyes. His smile was genuine and relaxed.

"Batman and Robin?"

"You know that I've thought of Ranger has Batman since the first day that I met him," I said around a bite of pizza. "It only makes sense that Tank is Robin."

"And the rest of us are just the Merry Men?"

"No," I said as I sat back up and leaned across the table. "The Justice League."

That earned me another laugh. His laugh was often infectious and I ended up chuckling right along with him. He reached across the table and cupped my face with his hands. He leaned the rest of the way across the table and captured my lips with his. It was a sweet, playful kiss that still managed to steal my breath. He had a wonderful way of making me feel like every kiss was the first kiss. He slowly ran his tongue along my lower lip and the pulled back as he released my face.

"So," he said pulling me out of my lust filled haze. "The Justice league?"

"Do you want me to tell you who every one is?" I asked with a little bit of excitement. I had spent a lot of time thinking about this during the last week of doing surveillance. I always got bored staring at houses all night.

"Sure," he said with an amused smile. "Tell me what you've got."

"Lester is Flash."

"Flash?"

"He's pretty quick on his feet and he definitely has the playboy thing down along with that lazy smile of his," I said as I grabbed another piece of pizza.

"Okay," he said after he thought about it for a moment. "I can see him as Flash. Who else?"

"Bobby is Kent Nelson. Doctor Fate."

"I don't remember a Doctor Fate," he said with a frown.

"He was a sorcerer that wears a golden helmet that his predecessor can speak to him through," I informed him as I threw my napkin on the table as a sign of surrender.

"Bobby's not a magician."

"Sure he is. He pulls things out of thin air all of the time. You just don't notice it," I said defensively.

"Okay. Next."

"You're gonna love this one. Junior is J'onn J'onnz."

"The martin with the cape?" he asked with a grin. "How did you come up with that one?"

"He's been working on the ESP thing. He's almost as good as Ranger. Plus," I said as I leaned forward, getting into the topic, "he can find anything."

"Okay," he said as he leaned forward. I had really gotten his interest on this subject. "What about Woody?"

"Woody is easy. He's Oliver Queen. The Green Arrow."

"He is good at archery," he commented. "That's a good one. What about Hal?"

"Hal and Cal are wrapped up together. They are Dove and Hawk," I said with a sheepish grin.

"Aw. Cal is Hawk, who is always ready for action. Hal is Dove, who is always trying to talk his way out of stuff," he said as amusement flickered through his eyes. "Although I don't think that Hal would be all that impressed with being referred to as a dove."

"Probably not. Binkie was a little more difficult."

"Binkie is kind of plain, isn't he?" he said.

"He isn't plain," I scoffed. "He has the ability to make himself blend in and disappear. He is Rex Manson. Metamorpho."

"Binkie isn't a shape shifter!"

"Simple technicality. He fooled everyone at Halloween when he dressed up as a woman," I pointed out.

He rolled his eyes and waved his hand for me to continue on.

"Vince is definitely Vic Sage who is The Question."

"He has the blank face down," he chuckled.

"Plus, he's nosier then hell," I added with my own laugh. "Brett was another easy one."

"Oh, yeah?"

"He's Vigilante."

"The cowboy?"

"That was a pretty obvious one. The light Texas accent and the fact that he can rope a cow…" I shrugged, "It was the only option for Brett."

"What about me?" he finally asked.

This was the one that I was dreading. He already had a sufficient ego. This was going to make his head swell so big, that I won't be able to get him out the double door. Let alone get him through my apartment door back at RangeMan. He was patiently waiting for me to label him like I had the rest.

"You're going to laugh at me," I said softly as I felt me face start to heat up.

"Sweetie," he said as he took my hand in his. "You have to tell me who you picture me as. I have to know who's shoes I'm trying to fill."

"Okay," I relented. "You're Superman."

"I can't fly, Sweetie," he said as confusion swept across his face.

"You may not be able to fly, but you do have a majority of his other qualities."

"Such as…"

"I know that you have x-ray vision because you always know the color of my underwear," I said quickly. "You have super hearing because you always hear me calling for you, even when I'm on a different floor. On top of all that, you are one of the strongest people I know."

He cupped my face with his hands and pulled me half way across the table. His lips crashed down on mine and I thought that my head was going to fly off. The kiss threw me off guard. It wasn't one of his normal sweet, tender kisses. This kiss was overwhelmingly passionate and strong. He broke the kiss and pulled back a hair so that his lips brushed against mine as he spoke.

"I'll be Superman on one condition."

"What's that?" I asked stupidly.

"That I can alter the name to SuperRam," he joked.


	11. Chapter 11

Disclaimer: JE owns the characters.

A/N: This one isn't like the rest of the shorts that I've done. It came to me just before I fell asleep last night. I hope that you enjoy this. You may want to grab some tissues.

* * *

I only pulled the memory of that weekend out of it's carefully locked box when I sat in this one place. I had plenty of memories that he had dominated, but this one was precious to me. I felt the first tear slip out as I slowly took the memory out of it's ornately carved box that I had tucked in the back of my mind. 

_Flashback._

_It was four o'clock in the afternoon on a Friday. It was a beautiful April day. The sun was shining and there was a light breeze. I was pulling away from the bonds office, where I had dropped off Lula after a successful day, when my cell phone rang. I fished it out of my pocket and answered it without looking at the caller I.D._

"_Yo," I said when I put my phone to my ear._

"_I need help," he said._

_I knew the voice all too well. We had spent the last three months doing surveillance together. He was the only one that wasn't bothered by my constant fidgeting and my lack of being able to tolerate silence. We were comfortable with each other. He had dropped his mysterious Merry Man blank face and let me in. We were friends._

"_I don't think that I can give you the kind of help that you need," I joked._

"_Funny," he said dryly. "Can you please come out to my house?"_

"_Sure," I said as I made an illegal u-turn. "I'll be there in twenty."_

"_I'm out back," he said and then hung up on me._

_I remembered singing along with Sarah McLachlan as I drove to the out skirts of Trenton. He had purchased the house two years ago and had never done anything with it. Until he showed it to me two months ago. Since then, he had spent every free moment restoring the 1940's house. I came to a stop on the side of the street and barely recognized the house. I was certain that I had the right house because his red, 1970 Oldsmobile 442 was sitting in the driveway._

_I climbed out of the RangeMan Bronco that I had commandeered three weeks ago when my Jeep bit the dust with a bang. I slowly made my way up the new brick path that lead from the street up to the front porch. He had re-seeded the front yard and got the trees trimmed up. The house had a fresh coat of light yellow paint and white trim had been freshened up as well. It looked like he had ripped out the old porch and replaced it with a larger one. He had even added a bench swing and some flower pots._

_I made my way around the side of the house and froze in my tracks when I saw him. A white tank top clung to his torso, faded jeans hung low on his narrow hips. He was tapping an empty bottle of Heineken against his right thigh as he stared at the two large oak trees that stood in his back yard. I watched as he yanked the blue handkerchief out of his back pocket and wiped the back of his neck off. His skin glistened in the sun as he moved and my mouth instantly started to water. Two months of no sex was really starting to wear on me. I heard him give a grunt and shake his head._

"_They're trees," I said as I started walking over to him._

"_I know that," he said as he turned around to face me. _

_He smiled at me as he lifted his empty bottle, silently asking if I wanted one too. I nodded my head and followed him up to the house. I noted as we started walking that he had redone the back porch, as well. There were more potted plants and a out door table and chair set. He pointed at the chairs to indicate that I should sit down once we climbed the stairs. I walked over to the little seating area a flopped down while he went inside. I looked out into the back yard and admired his handy work. When he had first shown me the house, the back yard had been over run be weeds. The two oak trees had definitely seen better days. The old shed that had sat in the back corner of the yard had been torn down and replaced with a new one that looked like a smaller version of the house itself._

"_What do you think?" he said as he walked out the door with two fresh beers._

"_I can't even believe that I'm looking at the same yard," I said as I grinned up at him and took the beer that was offered. "The front of the house looks amazing. You should be proud of yourself."_

"_I am," he said as he sat in the chair next to me and laid his cowboy hat on the table. _

_Not many people could pull off being sexy as hell in a cowboy hat. He could. The way that he had looked at that moment, he should have been on the cover of Play Girl. He was covered in sweat and dirt. Mental head slap! I really needed to pull myself together. Raging hormones were starting to get the best of me. Having control over my feelings was not one of my better traits. It was a non existent trait most of the time._

"_So," I said as I looked back out into the yard. "What do you need my help with."_

"_Just one thing," he said as he placed his hat back on his head and stood up._

_I slid my hand into the one that he offered me and let him pull me out of the chair. He guided me down the steps and back out to where the trees stood. I honestly hadn't noticed the box that sat at the base of one of the trees. I walked over and knelt down in front of the box. I picked it up to examine it more closely. I smiled at the box when I remembered that I had told him that the two trees would be perfect to a hammock. I looked over my shoulder to show him my approving smile. He through his head back and laughed when I sat down in the grass and ripped open the box._

_Fifteen minutes later I was sipping a fresh beer and swinging in the hammock while he ran upstairs to take a shower. I rolled my eyes when Shania Twain's voice started drifting out of the open windows of the house. It was really the only thing that we argued about. I hated country music with a passion, he loved it more then life. I decided to tolerate it since we were at his house. He would just have to suffer the next time he showed up at my apartment._

That is the thought that always breaks me. I hadn't know at that moment that he would never step foot in my apartment ever again. The tears were streaming down my face. I reached into my purse and pulled out his blue hanky to dry off my face. I took a few deep breaths to calm myself down. I had to get through the whole memory, or it would eat at me until I came back here to finish it.

_I opened my eyes when the hammock stilled. He had on a fresh, white tank top and a clean pair of faded jeans on. Little droplets of water fell down the side of his face from under the cowboy hat. He reminded me of Val Kilmer in Tombstone. Blue eyes and dark brown hair that was in desperate need of a hair cut. I smiled up at him and took his out reached hand. He helped me out of the hammock and lead me into the house, keeping my hand in his. He lead me through the kitchen that he had shown me a week ago, in its finished stage, and pulled me up the back stair case. We walked down the hallway of the second floor and stopped in front of his bedroom door. He turned and smiled down at me._

"_I finally finished my bedroom and I wanted to show it to you," he said just before he opened the door._

_I hadn't been up to the second floor since the first time that he had brought me here. I was floored by the transformation. There was an antique, four post, oak king size bed. There were sheer, navy blue curtains that hung from the railing that ran from post to post. The same color curtains hung over the windows that were billowing in the breeze that came in the open windows. Matching antique night stands sat on either side of the bed. The walls were painted a subtle tan that matched the thin tan stripes in the navy blue comforter on the bed._

_I slowly walked into the room to get the full view. A forty inch flat screen TV hung on the opposite wall of the bed. There was an antique, nine drawer, dresser that sat under the TV. A padded chest sat under the picture window that faced out into the front yard. I walked into the master bathroom and my mouth fell open. A Jacuzzi bath tub sat on the left. It was navy blue and big enough to comfortably seat two Merry Men. The gleaming, navy blue porcelain toilet was now housed in its own little room that sat in the far left corner. A shower stall, with multiple jets, stood in the far right corner. It, too, was navy blue. I lightly ran my fingers over the white, granite counter top and around the two navy blue sinks that were imbedded in the counter._

"_This is amazing," I said as I turned and beamed at him._

"_You like it?" he asked nervously from his spot in the doorway._

"_I love it," I said as I walked over to him. "It's you, so it's perfect."_

_I hadn't thought about how I had phrased my words until they were already out. I felt my face burn once I thought about what my words may have implicated. I immediately averted my eyes and looked at the floor. He gently used his finger to lift my chin so that I was looking up at him. My breath hitched when I found his face inches from mine. He searched my eyes for a brief moment before his lips captured mine._

_My brain didn't connect with the rest of my body, and before I knew it, I was wrapped around his rock hard body. His hands trailed their way up my body and fisted in my hair. I let out a soft moan as he pulled me deeper into the kiss. I parted my lips and felt a shock wave of pleasure as his tongue danced across my tongue. I wrapped my legs around his waist as me feet left the floor._

_We broke the kiss long enough to get our shirts off once we got to the bed. He gently pushed me back and climbed on top of me. He rested his elbows on either side of my head and slowed the kissing down. I lost my breath at the tenderness that he was showing me. I reached up and cupped his face when he pulled back._

"_We can stop now and walk away friends," he whispered. His voice was husky with desire and I felt him pressing into my thigh. "If we go all the way, then you'll be stuck with me forever. I won't stand by and let you go back to Ranger, or Morelli. You need to make a choice right now."_

_I sunk my teeth into my lower lip. I had a dream about this two weeks ago and it had been all that I was able to think about. He was the best of both worlds that I wanted. I only hesitated for a moment and then I pulled his face back down to mine. I lightly kissed his chin and along his jaw line. When I got to his ear, I whispered, "I want you."_

_My words broke his control. He pinned my arms above my head and assaulted my mouth. Within seconds we were naked and he was placing open mouth kisses along my inner thigh. I whimpered as he lightly nipped at me. My body shattered when he slowly slid a finger inside me. An orgasm ripped through my body and left me shaking and breathless as he slowly fingered me._

_I felt his warm breath on my hip as I floated back down to earth. He was slowly, softly stroking my lips. I whimpered when he shifted and his finger disappeared. His name was ripped from my throat when his tongue started caressing me. A second earth shattering orgasm flooded my body as he licked ever centimeter of my core._

_I moaned when I tasted myself on his lips and tongue. He kissed his way across my jaw and down my neck. My breath got caught in my throat when he traced circles around my left nipple and tweaked my right nipple with his callused fingers. I felt the tip of his erection brush against me._

"_Please," I whispered._

_He groaned into my neck as he slowly slid inside me. I thought that he was going to rip me apart because I was still tight from the last orgasm. He stilled himself once he had buried himself to the hilt. He brought his lips back to mine as he slowly started moving. We caressed each other as we climbed higher and higher. He gasped my name as he exploded inside me. The feeling of his release sent me flying over the edge and I was swept away by another orgasm._

_We clung to each other as we drifted down from heaven. I ran my hands through his thick hair as he rested his head on my chest. We stayed there and watched as the sun set and the stars started glittering in the night sky outside the window. _

I will remember everything about that day for the rest of my life. He had given me a glimpse of what life could have been like. He had given me everything in the two days that we had shared in his house.

That first night had been one hundred and ninety-four days ago. He was killed during an apprehension one hundred and ninety-one days ago. I had told him and Tank that my spidey-sences were going off and I thought that going after this guy was a bad idea. They had both assured me that they had checked and re-checked all of their intel on their FTA. They had a fool proof plan and I was just worrying too much.

That night, I had sat in the control room with Hal and listened to everything go very wrong. I heard the gun fire over the radio. I saw spots in my eyes as I heard the explosion and his GPS tracker fell off the grid. I remember screaming as my heart broke into a million peices and then I passed out.

Tank had told me later that he had been using one of the Broncos as cover and their FTA had shot at the gas tank. The rest of the guys had gotten lucky and walked out of there with minor bullet wounds.

I took the white rose out of my lap and placed it in the grass at the base of his head stone. I ran my fingers across the lettering as I rubbed circles across my swollen abdomen. I weakly smiled when his child kicked my hand.

"I just wanted to come see you," I said quietly as I got on my knees. "I've decided that I'm going to name him after you."

My throat closed up as grief flooded through me. It was so unfair that he would never get to see what we had created together during that one perfect weekend. Hal had come to the doctor's appointment with me and said that he would have been so happy to hear that he was having a son.

"Steph?"

I looked over at Bobby and gave him a watery smile. I took his out reached hand and let him pull me up off the ground. I slipped my arm around his waist as we looked down at the grave. Bobby squeezed my shoulders and kissed my hair. The guys had rallied around me when I found out that I was pregnant. They were a gift from God, just like the child that I'm carrying.

"I miss him," I whispered.

"I miss him, too, Steph," Bobby whispered back. "Are you ready to go?"

"Give me one more second."

"Sure, Steph," Bobby said as he released me and made his way back to the Bronco.

I pulled the hanky out and wiped my face to dry away the tears. I slowly locked the memories back in the box that sat in the back of my mind. I wouldn't think about it until I came back here. He wouldn't want me to dwell on what might have been. I had done that for three weeks after he was killed. It took me going to a therapist to get control over my emotions.

I eased back down in front of his head stone and traced my fingers over the lettering one more time. I dropped my hand and slowly stood up.

"Til we meat again, My Love," I whispered.

I turned around and started walking back to the Bronco. Bobby held the door open for me and helped me get in. He smiled as he rubbed my belly and then lightly closed the door. I looked over at the grave as Bobby walked around the front of the Bronco.

I placed my hand on the window and whispered, "I love you, Vince."


	12. Chapter 12

Disclaimer: I own none of these characters.

* * *

A/N: A 'thank you' goes out to Myminorobsession for the idea for this chapter in my never ending quest for Steph to share a scene with a different Merry Man. I'd also like to thank my trusty Bissell carpet cleaner for helping my pull this one shot out of my ass. My Muse seems to be trapped inside it. It's possible that she got trapped inside while I was cleaning the carpet in my son's room. How to get her out? Last, but never least, a big THANK YOU to Ranger Craving. I couldn't have done this without you, Linda.

* * *

My name is Stephanie Plum. I'm known throughout my home town of Trenton, New Jersey as the Bombshell Bounty Hunter. I hung up my bounty hunter hat about a year ago and started working full time for my mentor, and Cuban Sex God, Ranger. Working at RangeMan as given me the opportunity to get my mom off my back, with their exceptional benefit package, and keep a vehicle for more the nine months. That's a record! I still do the occasional apprehension with my ex- partner Lula. She's gotten a lot better in the last nine months and she only calls when she gets an especially wily one. Or, if Simon Diggery goes FTA. Lula is very afraid of his python. Not that I can blame her.

Most days, I really enjoy my job. I get to hang out with some very fine ass men and I get paid to do it. Who wouldn't love my job? Unfortunately, today is not one of those days. I'm staring at my 'in' box and mentally cursing God for giving me the gift of being a top notch dirt digger. On a good day, I walk in to about twenty search requests. I'm looking at about fifty.

I sighed and shook my head as I sat in my chair. The guys are going to make me go blind today. I went through my regular routine of sorting the requests into piles. Tank had four requests, that's normal. Binkie had three requests, that's normal, too. Lester had two requests, that's more then normal. The other forty-three belonged to _him_. I felt like my head was going to explode. He has been the bane of my existence since the first time that I ever started working at RangeMan. I could feel my right eye start to twitch. Shit!

I pushed away from my desk and sailed across the isle, stopping in Lester's cubicle. He smiled down at me for a brief moment and the saw the rage that must have been apparent in my eyes. I have yet to master my blank face. I've been told by a few different Merry Men that I just look constipated.

"What's wrong?" Lester asked as he reached out and tucked a stray curl behind my ear.

"Have you seen my 'in' box!" I shouted. I didn't really mean to shout at Lester. He's a great friend and we always have a great time when ever we team up. I sighed and shook my head when he started chuckling. "Sorry."

"It's okay, Bomber," he said as he leaned back in his chair and laced his fingers behind his head. "How many did he hit you with?"

"Forty-three," I growled as I crossed my arms over my chest.

"Ranger had a big meeting yesterday with a prospective client."

"You would think that he could do some of this shit on his own. What does he do all day?"

"Calm down, Kiddo," Lester said with a chuckle. I think that he saw the plan hatch in my head as I stared at him. He put him fingers in his ears and shouted, "I DON'T WANT TO KNOW!"

I gave him a wicked grin as I rolled myself out of his cubicle and back to my own. I thought that it might be best if I got the other guys their searches done first. I buckled down and got through Tank's in just under an hour. I started running Binkie's and then ran over to Tank in the control room to give him his files.

"Don't say a word to me," Tank said with his blank face on.

I must still have that gleam in my eye. Tank is usually a little more talkative. Either that, or Lester has been shooting his mouth off again. I decided that I should cover all of my bases and I stopped at Lester's cubicle before I went back to mine. I placed my hands on his shoulder and started massaging them. I worked my way across his broad shoulders and then wrapped my hands around his neck. I leaned over so that my lips were right next to his ear when he stilled.

"If you breathe a word about my revenge…" I whispered and then lightly squeezed his neck. I released him when he audibly gulped.

Ranger was standing in the walkway as I sauntered out of Lester's cubicle. I flashed him a smile and he took a step back. I was really starting to wish that my eyes weren't a direct link to my mind. My smile turned devilish as I gave him a little finger wave and sashayed my way into my 'lair'. I heard him chuckle and then ask Lester who I was after now. Lester was a good little pet and didn't answer. Although I couldn't be certain. Lord knows that they do an awful lot of ESP around here.

Exacting revenge on a Merry Man is difficult, at best. It takes an extreme amount of concentration, cunning, and a death wish if you go after certain ones. Fortunately, today, I have the concentration and the cunning. He wasn't one of the ones that fell into the category of 'Merry Men who wouldn't think twice about shipping me off to a third world country'. I continued with my searches for Binkie as I plotted my scheme. I was finished forty-five minutes later so I walked to Binkie's cubicle with my hand over my eyes. I dumped his files on his desk and smiled down at where I thought he was.

"Bomber?"

"Don't ask me any questions and I shall tell you no lies," I said as I tried to suppress a laugh.

I exited Binkie's cubicle and made my way back to mine. I couldn't hide the smile on my face at the thought that I was about a half an hour away from exacting my revenge. I frowned at my 'in' box. It had magically grown during the three minutes that it took me to drop off Binkie's files. I leafed through the new requests and felt my eye start to twitch again. Ten more requests from _him_, bringing his total to fifty-three.

I calmly placed the files on top of his stack and placed a sticky note on my monitor that simply said 'stairwell'. I grabbed a bottle of water out of the fridge in the break room and walked over to the door that led to the stairs. I opened the door and stepped through. I heard Ram groan just before the door closed. I drank half of the bottle and then sat it on the floor in the corner of this landing.

I set my watch to go off in twenty minutes and the started running up the stairs. Ram had groaned because he was the one that turned me on to this. When I get to the top of my frustration level, eye twitching and all, this is what I do. Ram suggested that I run up and down the stairs. I have to admit, at the end of twenty minutes, I'm not pissed off any more. Plus, my ass has never looked better.

My watched beeped at me when I was down by the garage, so I headed out the door. Hal and Cal were loading up one of the Broncos with surveillance equipment. They stopped for a moment and looked at me. I grinned and waved as I started walking off my run. They looked at each other and then disappeared. They were there one second, and then I heard the stairwell door click closed the next. Am I really that dangerous when I'm scheming?

I took my time climbing back up to the fifth floor. No matter how much the man pisses me off, I know that I still have to do the work. I wandered back over to my cubicle after I got another bottle of water. I found a sticky note just below my sticky note on my monitor.

_It would be really great if you could actually do your job, instead of running up and down the stairs._

My mouth just fell right open. I gaped at the hand writing that I knew all to well. He was such a dead man. Where did he get off telling me how to do my job? I felt like my head was going to explode. I couldn't very well run again. I backed out of my cubicle and walked backwards across the isle to Lester's cubicle. I reached down without looking and opened his bottom drawer. Still not looking, I grabbed his bottle of Jack, screwed off the top, and took a very big swig. I replaced the cap as my eyes watered, put the bottle back, and the walked back over to my cubicle. Not a word was spoken between Lester and myself. I had a feeling that he could feel the rage rolling off of me.

I was about an hour into my searches when I felt a familiar tingling on the back of my neck. I really didn't have time for Batman. I simply glanced over my shoulder and let my eyes do the talking. It only took him five seconds and then he was slowly moving backwards out of my cubicle and down the isle. I could hear Lester chuckling across the isle. The thread of control that I was clinging to snapped. I silently stood up and crept over to Lester's cubicle. I reached my hand out and then watched with satisfaction as Lester slumped over in his chair. I glanced over at the camera that was pointed in our direction and glared.

I pulled out my cell phone as it started ringing. I glanced at the caller I.D before I answered it. Control Room. I shook my head as I headed back into my cubicle. I sat down and flipped open my phone.

"Your secret is safe with me, Bomber," Cal said and then disconnected.

I always knew that I could count on Cal for just about anything. He had been on my side through a lot of bad shit and his loyalty to me had never wavered. I set back to my task at hand and dove back into my searches. Time has a tendency of slipping away from me when I get into my zone. I was abruptly pulled out of it when I distinctly smelled a meatball sub from Pino's. I looked over my shoulder and saw Lester standing just outside my cubicle.

"Peace offering," he said with a crooked grin as he held out the bag and Styrofoam cup.

I gladly took the bag and cup and kissed Lester on the cheek. All was forgiven and everything was right with the world. For the most part. I continued working as I ate. I had finished all fifty-three searches by three o'clock. I decided that it would be wise to take a brief break before I moved onto the revenge part of my plan.

I rolled my chair across the isle and into Lester's cubicle. Over the last year, I had come to find myself in his cubicle often. He was easy going and funny. Plus, he had a secret cache of candy and other naughty foods. I opened up his bottom drawer and pulled out a tin box that was located next to the Jack. I groaned as the smell of sugar hit me when I opened the box. I punched Lester in the arm when he started chuckling.

"I still have my stun gun," I warned. That silenced Lester immediately.

I fell into the wonderful world of chocolate and tuned out the rest of the world as I closed my eyes. I loved the way that a Hershey's Kiss melts in my mouth. I just hold it in my mouth and run my tongue over it. Back and forth. I roll it around and suck the melted chocolate off of the Kiss as it slowly disintegrates. I popped another one in my mouth and repeated the process, all the while, ignoring Lester. I reluctantly opened my eyes, figuring that I should probably go back to work, and noticed that Lester was sweating.

"Are you okay, Lester?" I asked as I placed a hand on his forehead. "You're burning up."

"I'm fine," Lester said as he pulled away.

I shrugged as I put the tin box back in the drawer and rolled back over to my desk. I was about to start on my plan when I heard Ram's voice.

"Holy shit," Ram whispered.

"You have no clue," Lester whispered.

"Is it always like that?"

"Yes," Lester groaned. "I get blue balls every time she eats chocolate in here."

"I though you were doing something to her," Ram whispered. I could hear the smile in his voice. "All of that moaning."

I couldn't keep my shoulders from shaking with my silent laughter. No wonder why he keeps all of the chocolate. I'm going to have to start rolling over there more often, I though as a grin spread over my face.

I needed to focus. I whipped out my pen and grabbed a stack of sticky notes. This was going to be so good.

**His POV**

I had just gotten back to my desk after a bathroom break and saw the stack of searches sitting on my desk. I glanced down at my watch and smiled at the fact that she had gotten them all done by four o'clock. That woman is one of the smartest that I know. I shouldn't have doubted that she would have gotten them all done before I left today.

I grabbed the top file as I sat down at my desk and saw the little sticky note on top. It said '_Here you go, Cowboy!_' in Steph's beautiful hand writing. I smiled at the note because I couldn't remember the last time someone had called me 'Cowboy'. It had been my nick name in the Ranger's, but everybody just calls me by my last name now. I shrugged and put the post-it on the bottom on my monitor as I turned it on to input the data that she had gathered for me.

I was a little surprised when I opened the second file and saw another sticky note. _I've been thinking about you_. I didn't really know her all that well and the thought of such a beautiful woman thinking about _me_ threw me off guard. I took the post-it and placed it on top of the first and went back to work.

There was another sticky note in the third file. _I had a dream about you last night. _I noticed that my heart rate picked up a little. She dreamt about me? Me? This can't be right. She must have me confused with someone else, right? I placed this post-it with the others and decided to ignore them and input the data like a good little soldier. I just needed to buckle down and get through the rest of this shit and then I could go grab a beer with Cal and Hal. I have a goal.

I think that I might have stopped breathing when I opened the fourth file. The little yellow post-it staring back up at me defiantly. As if to say 'You can't ignore me'. I pealed off the note and held my breath as I read it. _My mouth is watering with just the thought that you are nearby. _Okay, now I know that she is confused. She has never once hinted that she was interested in me. I wonder if she has suffered from some type of head injury lately. Some thing to ask Bobby about later.

Focus. Focus. Focus. My mind was starting to wander as I was doing the data thing. Those big, blue eyes. The curly, unmanageable hair. That beautiful ass. I need to make sure that I buy Ram a beer as a thank you for giving her the stair idea. God, I wanted to sink my teeth into the perfect ass. _WHOA! _Where in the hell did that come from. She is off limits, Man! What am I thinking?

I noticed that I had held my breath as I opened the next five files. Each time, I'd let out a silent sigh when there wasn't a post-it glaring up at me. Maybe she was just momentarily confused and put the post-its in the wrong files. She has been spending a lot of time in Lester's cubicle. Plus, I could have sworn that I heard her moans coming from over there a little while ago. That has to be the explanation.

Of course, I could be wrong. When I opened the next file, a little sticky note was hanging out inside. _I can still feel your hands glide up my back and fisting in my hair. The dream felt that real to me. _Oh. My. God. Is it getting a little warmer in here? Time to get rid of the jacket, I thought as I pealed off my sports coat. I need to start bringing a change of clothing when I know that I don't have meetings in the afternoon. I hung my jacket on the back of my chair and went back to the data business.

I felt a bead of sweat trickle down the side of my face when I saw the next sticky note. _I loved it when your hands slid into my hair as I took your rock hard erection in my mouth. You tasted like heaven._ Jesus! I need water. Yeah! That will help me calm down. I jumped up and almost ran to the break room. I yanked open the fridge door and downed the first bottle in one gulp.

"You okay, Man?" Lester asked from one of the tables.

I didn't even notice him when I ran in here. I nodded at him as I grabbed another bottle and downed it like the first. I felt my heart rate start to slow down when I got to the third bottle. I gave Lester a shrug after I grabbed three more bottles and headed back to my cubicle. I felt confident that I was under control as I sat back down in my chair.

I hesitantly took the next file and opened it up. I let my breath out in a whoosh of air when I saw that there wasn't anything in the file other then information. I got through the next six searches with out incident. I was starting to breath a little easier and smiled at what a 'Tard' I was being. Steph had a whole bunch of funny names like that. All the guys loved her like a sister. How could anyone resist her?

My breath hitched when I opened my next file and saw the sticky note. _I was delirious with need when your soft tongue drew lazy circle around my right nipple. _I loosened my tie and undid the top button of my shirt as I took another drink of water. I peeled the note off and leaned back in my chair. I leaned back a little further and looked down the isle towards Steph's cubicle. I could hear her laughing at something that Lester said and then a shoe sailed from her cubicle to his.

I shook my head to clear my thoughts and then leaned forward. It wasn't good to dwell on something that you would never have. Or, could I have her? There must be a reason for her to leave all of these sticky notes in the files that she knew would come to me first. Maybe this was her way of saying that she was interested.

I grabbed the next file and chugged some more water as I opened it up. I was still chugging when I pulled off the next sticky and read it. I dropped the water bottle when the worlds started sinking in. _I'm getting wet just thinking about how good you felt when your naked erection slid into me slowly._ Shit! Now _I'm_ all wet. The water bottle had poured out all over my pants when it fell out of my hand. I cursed myself as I bent over and picked up the bottle.

"Dude!" Ram said from his cubicle beside me. "What the hell are you doing over there?"

"Nothing," I growled.

"Well try to keep the water on your side of the wall. I already took a shower today."

"Fuck off, Ram!"

"No need to get huffy, Man. I'm just saying…"

"Yeah. I got it. Sorry," I grumbled as I used a bunch of tissues to wipe up all of the water that had spayed all over my desk and cubicle wall.

I got through ten more files before I was caught off guard by another post-it. _My hips bucked, meeting you thrust for thrust as you nibbled and sucked on my neck. _Holy Hell! I had a brief mental flash of burying myself in her. I torn off my tie and threw it into the corner of my cubicle as I felt my heart rate accelerate. I was going to end up going mad if I had to keep on coming across these notes after I had gotten myself calmed down.

I grabbed the stack of files and started going through them one by one. I grabbed the note and flipped it over as I'd place them on the desk. I wanted to get this over with quickly, but I was a man and I wanted to know what else she had written. Even if that meant suffering through Blue Balls. I placed the files back on my desk and eyeballed the small stack of post-its that I had found. I could hear them taunting me. I grabbed a bottle of water off of my desk and opened it as I leaned back in my chair and stared at the notes. I leaned a little further back and saw a tin box fly from Lester's cubicle to Steph's. Wonder what that's all about?

I waved off the thought and grabbed the notes. I kept them upside down and repeated my momentary mantra. One at a time. One at a time. One at a time. I placed my bottle on the desk and flipped the notes over to read the first note. _I whispered your name as I felt my orgasm start to pool in my stomach._ I felt myself twitch. I loved hearing my name roll off of her tongue.

My whole body tensed when I heard something coming from a few cubicles down. I leaned back in my chair and looked down the isle. There it is again. Oh Jesus! I can hear her moaning. I felt myself stir again and I closed my eyes as I took a deep breath. This woman is going to be the death of me. I leaned forward and looked at the next note. _I begged you to go harder and faster._ I know that I groaned. Reading those words and hearing her soft moans was slowly getting to me.

I undid one more button on my shirt and then flipped the next note over. _Your control snapped and you pinned my hands above my head as you ruthlessly banged into me_. I think that I need more water. My throat seems to be a little dry. Am I panting?

Next note. _I remember hearing you say to me that you wanted to hear me scream your name when I came_. My heart is racing and I'm definitely panting now. God help me, but I want this woman in the worst way. I could feel it in every cell of my body. I wanted to caress her cheek as I buried myself inside her. I needed her.

I flipped over the next note. _The sound of you husky voice, mixed with the brutal pounding, sent the first wave of my orgasm crashing down over me. _Yeah! I really needed to get my hands on her. I had a mental flash of her curls spread out over one of my pillows. Her intoxicating blue eyes looking up at me, filled with lust. I was now fully erect and I didn't care. I heard another moan come from her cubicle down the isle and I had to know what was next.

I flipped over the next note_. I screamed out your name as my orgasm took me all the way to heaven. _Sweet Jesus! She screamed my name. I groaned as I felt my own erection become painfully harder. God, she is a wet dream.

I anxiously flipped over the next note. _I heard you groan out my name as you emptied out into me_. I noticed the paper shake a little bit in my hand. Damn It! I had to finish this quickly.

_The sensation of you spilling out into me and hearing my name on your lips, sent me flying back towards heaven and I milked you dry. _

Two more buttons undone.

_We laid in a massive heap of flesh and sweat._

Shit! I'm out of water.

_You lifted your head up off of my chest and smiled at me_.

I felt another bead of sweat roll down the side of my face.

_You asked me if I enjoyed myself and I said…_

What? Damn it!

_Not if you ever leave fifty-three searches in my box again you little ass hole!_

It was all a trick? This wasn't real? I shot out of my chair and ran out of the office. I hit the stairs and ran to the gym. I sprinted across the gym and hit the door to the shower room at full tilt. I ran to the nearest shower and turned the water on full blast at the coldest setting. That evil woman.

**Steph's POV**

I chuckled at Lester when I saw him run out of his cubicle and hit the door to the stairs. Revenge is oh so sweet. I leaned back in my chair and smiled as I laced my fingers behind my head. I was about to shut down my computer when Tank came walking into my cubicle a few minutes later.

"What's up Tank?" I asked as I gave him my most innocent smile.

"Cam you tell me why Rodriguez is standing in the locker room shower, fully dressed, cursing under his breath, and shaking because of how cold the water is?"

I furrowed my brows for a moment to think about what Tank had just said. Then I shrugged and gave him a little grin. "I honestly can't say, Tank."


	13. Chapter 13

Disclaimer: JE owns the characters.

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I'm not really all that proud of the things that I've done in the last fifteen years. Especially that one night seven years ago. The one night that haunts me still.

I had graduated at the head of my class in high school. Recruiters swarmed me through my senior year. I was prepared to go to Cal State on a football scholarship. That was until I met with an Army recruiter. I had never really thought about serving for my country. Football was my ticket out of Odessa, Texas. It had been the only thing that I had thought about since I was nine years old.

My parents hadn't been very impressed when I told them that I had signed up for the Army. My mother didn't speak to me for two weeks and my father yelled at me every time that we were in the same room. It had broken my heart that they couldn't understand why I had wanted to do it. They didn't hear what the recruiter had said to me. I still remember every word that he had said.

"_There comes a time in a man's life when he has to think about the future. He has to think about the rest of the world and how it will effect his children. What we do now, will change the face of the planet. If you want to be a man that will help make that change, then you belong with us."_

That forty year old man, in his dress uniform, had changed my life. He was right. I had thought that one day, I would like to get married and have children of my own. Not a horde like my parents; I have six brothers and two sisters. But maybe, if I ever found the right girl, one or two might not be too bad. Let's face it. The world isn't a perfect place. But, the way that I saw it, there were a lot of ways that we could improve it. And just maybe, we could help other people along the way.

I took the placement test and then left two days after I graduated. I wrote my parents all through basic training. My mom was the only one that ever responded. My father still couldn't understand why I wasn't running around on a football field. I felt bad that I was disappointing my father, especially since he had rooted me on at every game my senior year.

The disappointment forced me to strive even harder through basic. I graduated, once again, at the top of my class. My mother had flown out to watch me graduate out of basic. She had sat there and cried, a sure sign that she had been proud of me. I got a week of leave before I headed into my occupational training. I went back to Odessa to spend that time with my family. I wasn't sure when I would have been able to come back.

That week had been a nightmare of sorts. My mother had gone around and talked like I was the best thing that had ever come out of Odessa and my father didn't speak to me. At all. Not one single word. It was with a heavy heart that I went into my next phase of training.

I showed a high aptitude for mechanics and chemistry. That led me down the road to being one of the top explosives experts in the Army. Being placed in such a prestigious group of much older people, sent me down a path that I would have never considered. Though, I should have expected it.

At the naïve age of twenty-two, just three weeks before I was due to be released from my contract with the Army, I was approached by my commanding officer with an opportunity to join the Rangers. I thought about it for five seconds and then nodded my head affirmatively. I think that moment was the turning point in my life.

I have never regretted anything in my life. Every God for saken mission that I did in the Rangers was for my country. I did as I was told when I was told to do it. I don't think that I could have handled everything that we went through if it hadn't been for the second team leader that I had. Ricardo Carlos Manoso. He had taught me how to block out the emotions that tried to influence my thoughts. He showed me how to shut everything else out and focus on the mission at hand. It was up to me to teach myself how to deal with it after the mission was over.

I stuck it out with Carlos for three years. Our whole team's contracts expired around the same time. Carlos had announced that he wasn't renewing his contract and we all agreed to follow him where ever he took us. That's how I ended up here. In Trenton, New Jersey. Carlos, better known as Ranger to most of the world, started his own security company. RangeMan. After seven years, he had four offices along the east coast. All of them are thriving.

But, here I sit, soaking wet, after being jolted awake by another nightmare. They seem to be getting worse and more frequent. I use to get them when I was in the Rangers. Back then, Bobby prescribed a medication for them. That almost got me kicked out of the elite team that I was apart of. I had to bite the bullet and see a shrink about them. That was the only way that Ranger would let me continue to be on his team.

I reached up to run my fingers through my hair and noticed that my hands were shaking. Shit! This is not a good sign. If I go to Bobby again, I know that he'll tell Ranger. Ranger will then pull me off the street and put me behind the desk. I can't do desk duty. I'll go crazy if I have to spend the next three months sitting in front of a computer.

I was so deep in thought that I didn't hear my apartment door open. I didn't even sense her until she touched my hair. It was a knee jerk reaction, but I grabbed her wrist and had her pinned to the wall next to my bed in two seconds. My left hand was wrapped around her throat and my Glock was pressed to her left temple. I could see her blue eyes staring up at me. With the light from the kitchen falling on her face, I could see that there wasn't a hint of fear, just concern.

"I got up to get a drink and I heard you scream," she whispered. "I wanted to make sure that you were okay."

I was looking into my partner's eyes and I was so ashamed of myself that I had done this to her. What if I had hurt her? What if I had pulled the trigger? I was still amped up from the intensity of the dream. I watched as she slowly reached up and gently pushed my hair off of my forehead. She didn't move to remove my hand from her throat and lower the gun from her head like I thought that she would. She had heard me and her first concern had been to make sure that I was okay. Of course, I had never told her about the nightmares. Or, the danger that I posed when I first woke up from them. I was still trying to pull myself out of 'military' mode.

I felt all of the anger and frustration diffuse in my body as she ran her fingers through my hair. I felt her other hand come up and lightly stroke the side of my face. This woman was so amazing to me. She had no fear of me, or of what I had become. She was reaching out and trying to comfort me.

I slowly replaced the safety on my gun as I lowered it and placed it on the table next to us. I slid my hand from the front of her throat to the back as I pulled her into my arms. I felt the after effects of my adrenaline rush set in and my arms started to shake. She wrapped her arms around my waist and pulled me closer as she laid her head on my chest. I tried to keep a tight grip on my control, but it was quickly slipping out of my grasp. I felt my legs start to shake and I slid us both down to the floor before I collapsed.

She climbed into my lap and silently held me. I felt her fingers slid across my neck and shoulders as she whispered in my ear. I'm not sure what she was saying, but I felt myself start to dissolve in her arms. I focused on her soothing voice as she used a foreign language and her soft fingers running in slow circles. Would she ever know just how much I needed her?

"Are you okay?" she finally asked in a whisper once the shaking subsided.

"I think so," I whispered back.

She leaned back slightly and cupped my face in her hands. She stared straight into my eyes and I chose not to hide my pain from her. No matter how much I hated myself for what happened that night, I was tired of hating myself by myself. I wanted to open up and share my pain with someone. I knew that I could tell her anything and she wouldn't judge me by my past.

I saw something flash through her eyes. Understanding? I'm not sure because as quickly as it was there, it was gone. She released my face and crawled out of my lap. I was certain that she was going to leave when she walked out of my bedroom. I had come so close to killing her just minutes ago. I was a little surprised when I heard her soft voice as she moved through my kitchen. She came back to me a few moments later with two bottles of water.

"I never got my water," she said with a sheepish smile as she handed me a bottle.

I smiled back up at her as I took the offered water. I didn't realize how thirsty I was until the water hit my tongue. I watched her move into the bathroom over the bottom of the bottle as I drank. She grabbed a wash cloth from under the sink and ran it under some water. She jumped when she looked up at her reflection in the mirror. I'm sure that she thought that she was a frightening sight. She probably wouldn't understand that I thought that she was the most beautiful woman when she was fresh out of bed. I guess that's why I loved waking her up in the morning to go work out. Her mass of curls in disarray. Her blue eyes always seemed to be bluer when they first opened.

"Who were you talking to?" I asked when she walked out of the bathroom and headed towards me.

"I called the control room," she said as she knelt down in front of me with a wash cloth in her hand. "I told Bobby that we were going to be off the grid until our next shift starts in two days. No one is to contact us unless World War Three erupts."

"What's the wash cloth for?" I asked as I eyed her hand.

"Lean your head back and close your eyes," she said. After I didn't move for a moment, she added, "Trust me."

That's a breaker for me. I leaned my head back against the bed and closed my eyes. I had learned to trust her with my life over the past six months. She had proven herself over and over again. I know that she's saved my ass on two different occasions. How could I not trust her?

I couldn't help but jump when the cold wash cloth touched my neck. I heard her chuckle at my reaction as she started wiping me down with the wash cloth. It felt good to have the cool cloth wipe away the sweat. She started at my neck and worked her way down my chest. I heard her wave the cloth in the air to cool it down and then she wiped down both of my arms. Thoughts of showering with her floated into my mind. Her hands lightly running across my skin. Her voice broke my dangerous train of thought.

"Do you want to talk about it?" she asked quietly once she finished wiping me down.

"The past can be frightening," I said as I opened my eyes and lifted my head up to look at her. "You know that all of us have done and seen terrible things."

"I'll understand if you don't want to tell me," she said as she stood up. She nodded at the bed and said, "Climb in."

I watched her walk back to the bathroom and warred with myself over how much I could tell her. I slowly got up and laid back down in my bed. I was no closer to the answer when she came back over to my bed after she turned the lights off in the kitchen and climbed in next to me. I was a little confused as to why she was in my bed until she pulled me into her arms and placed my head on her shoulder. She wanted to comfort me and offer anything that her partner might need. I threw my left arm and leg over her and snuggled as close as I felt she would let me. I slowly started to relax as she started running her fingers through my hair with her left hand in the darkness of my room. It was different with her in the dark. Her right hand started lightly massaging my left forearm and everything started slipping out of my mouth. I told her everything that had happened.

"I had been with my first unit for almost a year," I said quietly as I started my story. "We'd been called up for a mission. When we got to the base camp, Ranger and his unit were already there. When my buddies and I saw them there we were stoked. Ranger didn't get called in unless it was something big. There wasn't a guy in the Forces that didn't want to serve under him. He had one badass reputation, and only the best of the best made his team."

"I wasn't an officer, so I didn't know any more about what was going on than any of the other guys in my unit. We spent three days hanging out, training, joking around, basically waiting for our assignment. We could see Ranger and his men out training every day, and we'd pass them coming and going in the camp. Most of the guys in my unit were pretty young, and they were too intimidated to start up a conversation with any of them."

I heard her lightly chuckle. She knew how intimidating Ranger could be. Especially to those that didn't know him. I cleared my throat before I continued down that path that I had chosen to take.

"On the third day, we got word that we had forty-eight hours to get our gear together and ourselves ready. According to my commanding officer, we were going to be the lead team in an offensive strike on an enemy camp. It was our mission to draw attention away from the camp so that Ranger and his men could go in and do an extraction. Apparently they were holding a prisoner there, and they were to get in and bring him out alive."

"A distraction," I heard her murmur.

"Yes, of the most deadly kind," I said with a slight shake of my head. "Later that night, I heard Ranger telling my C.O. that he had a bad feeling about the mission, that something felt _off_. They talked about if for a little bit and then the two of them headed off toward the officer's tent to talk to the general in charge. A few hours later I was just dozing off when they returned. It was pretty easy to tell they were both pissed. My commanding officer was bitching about puffed up bureaucratic paper pushers who'd been out of the field too long."

"When I finally fell asleep they were still talking," I continued as I reached up and started playing with one of her curls. "The next morning my unit was gathered together. The Commander told us to keep our eyes open, that something didn't feel right about the mission, and he wanted us to know how he felt. Then, he told us that Ranger was looking for a new man for his unit and that he'd been watching us on the training field. When Ranger stepped forward and called my name, I couldn't believe it. I had mixed emotions. This was a huge honor, but I was leaving behind men that I'd lived and worked with for a year. I knew about their wives and kids and girlfriends."

"The plan was for my old unit to approach the camp from the south about six hours ahead of us. Ranger's unit, my unit, would then approach from the northeast about two hours before sunrise. I was new to the group, but it didn't take long to realize that the men weren't happy. If Ranger had a bad feeling about the mission, they all had a bad feeling about the mission," I said. "Ranger kept telling us to keep our eyes and ears open and report anything to him that seemed suspicious immediately."

"We heard gunfire and explosions as we got closer to the camp where the prisoner was supposedly being held. Suddenly Ranger stopped. After about 5 minutes of waiting Ranger told us to change course," I recounted. I stopped speaking for a moment to get myself calmed down. I felt the anger start pool in my gut and I didn't want to explode with her being so close to me. I took a few deep breaths and then continued.

"He had us double back and head south to where we knew my old unit was," I finally said. "The move saved our lives. We were walking into a trap. By the time we got over to where the fighting had taken place, every man in my unit had been butchered. Most were lucky and had been shot. Several had been captured and tortured. There were bodies and limbs everywhere, and the ground ran red with blood. My commanding officers head had been severed and hung from a branch of a tree. I walked to each body one by one. Greg, whose wife had just had a baby that he'd never even seen. Mark, with the cute little twin girls. Brad who had his high school sweetheart waiting at home for him."

"The next few hours were like walking through a dream. Tank came over to me and told me to move my ass. I don't remember much after that. I followed along in a daze. The whole thing had been a set up. The camp was full of soldiers waiting to kill us. The prisoner wasn't even being held there. Apparently Ranger already knew where the Intel had come from, and without waiting for orders we started tracking the bastard."

I fell silent for a while. She had stopped moving and I was afraid that I might have frightened her, even though I was just glossing over everything that had happened. She hadn't seen the things that I had. She was still soft. She hadn't been hardened by the ugly things of the world like I had. I hated myself for putting this on her, but I knew that she might be the only one that could understand.

"It took us two days to find him and catch up to him," I said once she started running her hands through my hair once again. It was like she was telling me that she was ready for me to continue. "When we finally did, he was holed up in a falling down shack. Ranger and Tank went in first. Once they determined he was alone and the place wasn't booby-trapped, Ranger came out and motioned me inside. When I walked in, every ounce of fury and shock I'd felt for two days, came bubbling up through my body. As I approached the traitor, I was dimly aware of Ranger and Tank leaving and closing the door behind them. I did things to that man that I never would have believed myself capable of."

I gave her a few moments to digest everything that I had just told her. I had dumped everything that I could and I was disgusted with myself for doing it. I slightly tightened my grip on her because I was afraid that she was going to bolt before I got to tell her the rest.

"I found out later that Ranger's official report stated that the man was already dead when we got there," I said quietly as I tilted my face up towards hers. "Both Ranger and Tank covered for me."

I could see the silhouette of her face. She looked over at me and I could see that her eyes were filled with tears. Her right hand came up and cupped the side of my face as she gave me a watery smile. She sniffed a little and then kissed my forehead in a comforting gesture. She pulled my head back under her chin and started stroking my hair again.

We stayed there for the rest of the night and into the next morning. Neither one of us speaking or making a move to leave the bed. She had been there for me through the night and held me. I was in awe of this magnificent woman who I was lucky enough to have as my partner. I had no clue what I had ever done to deserve her. I almost jumped out of my skin when she finally spoke.

"Jump in the shower and pack an overnight bag," she said as she slowly slid out from underneath me. "Meet me in my room in an hour."

I did as I was told through a haze of confusion. What did she have up her sleeve? I threw a bag together and walked into her apartment. She was just finishing up putting her bag together and I guess the sight of me caught her off guard because she froze in the middle of putting her clothes in her bag. A big smile slowly spread across her beautiful lips when her eyes trailed their way up my body. I was just wearing a Pink Floyd t-shirt, jean shorts, and Vans. But, I guess she was used to seeing me in my RangeMan uniform. The look in her eyes reminded me of the way that she looks at chocolate cake.

"If you keep staring at me, then we won't get out of here," I said as I leaned against the door frame to her bedroom with a lopsided grin.

I watched her cheeks turn a soft pink as she turned back to her bag and stuffed her clothes in. We left the RangeMan building in her Jeep and headed out of town. I knew where we were going before we got to the outskirts of town. We ended up spending the day on the beach in Point Pleasant. We hadn't spent a day together out of RangeMan work related stuff. She was so full of life. I felt myself slowly falling in love with her.

She told me funny stories about growing up with her crazy family. I couldn't remember a time when I had laughed so hard for so long in my life. I found myself opening up to her about my family. She had seemed rather disappointed that I hadn't been back to see my family since the week before I went into the Rangers. She could relate to family driving people crazy, but she couldn't understand why I didn't want to go back. She felt that phone calls and letters didn't come close to a hug from a mother.

We got rooms next to each other at a hotel that sat on the beach after we had dinner at a little sea food restaurant. I gave a huge sigh when I unlocked and opened the door that adjoined the two rooms. I was faced with another door that was locked on her side. I thought about picking the lock and decided against it. I flung myself on the king size bed and stared at the ceiling. I was silently cursing my raging hormones when I heard the lock to the adjoining door tumble. I lifted myself up on my elbows and watched her door slowly swing open.

She didn't come in. I saw all of the lights slowly go out in her room. Then there was nothing. She didn't come in! How was I suppose to sleep knowing that she was this close, yet so far away. I stared at the door for a few moments. Nothing was happening. I let out a deflated sigh as I dropped my head back down on the bed. My fingers had been aching to touch her all day, but I kept myself just out of reach. I didn't want to ruin our partnership. I guess, more then anything, I wouldn't be able to stand it if she rejected me.

I shucked everything but my boxers and climbed between the sheets. I tossed and turned for about an hour. I was slowly going mad at the thought that her soft, warm body was just on the other side of the wall. I had never allowed myself to really think about her until today. She's not the type of girl that could be another notch in the bed post. I had been with plenty of girls like that . Steph was the type of girl that you wrote home about. She was the girl that my mom kept asking about.

I was jerked out of my thoughts when I heard something coming from her room. I held my breath and listened more closely. A smile spread across my lips when I realized that she was tossing and turning. My chest started to shake with silent laughter when I heard her curse quietly as she beat the crap out of a pillow and then flop back down on the bed. She was silent for a few minutes and then she started tossing and turning again. It looks like I'm not the only one having problems tonight, I thought to myself.

I rolled over and looked at the door. I had left the bathroom light on with the door cracked so that there was just enough light to see the rest of the room. I wanted to run to her room, but at the same time, I wanted her to make the choice to come in here. I was rewarded with my patience when I heard her slip out of her bed and walk through her room towards the door. She peeked her head in and looked over at me. I shot her a grin and patted the bed next to me. She practically ran to my bed as I moved the covers back for her. She jumped into the bed and flopped down, doing a great impression of a log.

She jumped when I reached under the covers and found her hand. She finally let out the breath that she had been holding and laced her fingers with mine. I had to smile at the fact that she was nervous laying here next to me. I didn't think that she would be after laying with me in the early hours this morning. I scooted over to her and draped my left leg over her as I laid my head on her shoulder. She slowly released my hand and wrapped her arm around my neck to scoot me closer. I slid my left hand across her flat stomach and up the side of her ribs as I settled myself down with her.

I felt electricity surge through the air when I nuzzled into her neck and my lips grazed her soft skin. She tilted her head slightly to allow me more access. I took this as an open invitation and started lightly feathering my lips across her neck. I leaned up on my elbow as I started working my way across her jaw. I felt her melt beneath me when my lips captured hers. I slid my tongue across her lips and I was rewarded greatly when she moaned and opened her lips for me.

Our tongues danced together and I could have sworn that the temperature in the room shot up twenty degrees when I slowly slid my left hand under her shirt. I lightly trailed my fingers across her stomach and up to just under her breasts. I chuckled against her lips when I felt her body shift and her beast landed in my hand. I skimmed my thumb across her nipple and felt in stiffen immediately as I repositioned my body between her legs. I never broke the kiss that was slowly sucking the control out of me.

She giggled as I broke the kiss to rip her shirt off and sent it sailing across the room. I slid my hands over her naked skin and marveled over its softness. My eyes traveled from her perfect six pack of abs to her wonderfully perky breasts to her amazingly crystal clear blue eyes. I slowly lowered myself down to her as I kept her eyes trapped my mine. There was a flicker of self doubt that pasted across her face.

"We can stop," I whispered when I stopped just a hair away from her lips.

I waited for her to answer. I didn't want to push her if she was having doubts about being with me. I wanted her more then anything that I had ever wanted in my life. But, I wanted her to want me the same way. I felt her hands start to trail their way up my abs and across my chest. Her hands slowly came up to cup my face. She brought my lips the rest of the way down to hers and they were fused together with a searing kiss that stole my breath.

My hands gained brains of their own and fisted in her silky curls as I lowered my hips down to hers. Her legs wrapped around my hips and she bucked slightly. My body lit on fire when I started grinding against her as I stated kissing my way across her jaw. She moaned when I hit the sweet spot where her neck met her shoulder. Her nails bit into my skin when I sunk my teeth into her as I felt her hand sneak into the front of my boxers. I almost lost it when her little fingers wrapped around my shaft and gently tugged.

I wanted to sink into her, but I knew that I wanted it to be good for her too. Knowing myself as I do, I rolled us over so that she was on top of me. She smiled down at me and I saw excitement flash across her face. Had no one ever let her be in control? Her excitement turned devilish as she moved my arms up and under the pillows.

"Don't move," she whispered against my lips just before she kissed me senseless.

She slowly nipped and kissed her way down my jaw to my neck. Her sweet tongue darted out and caressed the hallow spot above my collar bone. I groaned softly when she started kissing her way down to my chest. My breath hitched in my throat when her nails scraped across my erection as her tongue drew circles around my nipple. She was doing a great job of driving my delirious with need. I took a deep breath and slowly released it as she slithered her way down my body. I was trying to gain control of myself, it wasn't working out to well.

I'm not quite sure how, but my boxers mysteriously disappeared. I knew that this woman was magic when her soft, warm tongue first touched the tip of my erection. I was suddenly lost to my sensations as her tongue, lips, and hands attacked me. I had a white knuckle grip on the head board and my hips raised up off of the bed as her tongue drove me closer to the edge.

She went into over drive as she felt my muscles start to twitch as I teetered on the edge of reason. I flooded her mouth and moaned her name as the most intense orgasm I have ever had flowed through my body. I was still trying to catch my breath when I felt her slowly start to move up my body. I opened my eyes and was blessed to see a set of blue eyes smiling down at me. I peeled my fingers off of the head board and wrapped my arms around her as she kissed me slowly.

I felt myself start to stir when she deepened the kiss. I wanted to fulfill her every fantasy. With that thought lingering in my mind, I laid perfectly still and let her continue to have her way with me. With a new sense of power, she shifted down my body and I went completely hard when I felt her lightly rub against me. The magician had removed the rest of her clothes without me noticing.

I, once again, found my hands white knuckle gripped on the head board as she slowly took me inside her. She lowered her lips to mine as she allowed herself to get use to the feeling of my naked erection inside of her. The feeling of her wrapped around me was intensely erotic. All tight and wet. I unconsciously raised my hips off of the bed to get further inside of her. I felt her smile against my lips as she jabbed me lightly in the ribs.

I felt my mouth go dry when she leaned back and sat up on me. The little light that came out of the bathroom fell across her body. I watched in admiration as the sex goddess, that I knew was trapped inside, come out. She tilted her head back as she started to slowly ride me. I desperately wanted to reach out and touch her, but to my amazement, her hands started caressing her own body. I gritted my teeth to hold on to my control as I watched her hands roam over her sweat slicked skin. They started on her hips and then her finger tips lightly ran their way across her abs. I was hypnotized as I watched her fingers trail their way up the center of her abs and across the tops of her breasts. She picked up the pace of her bouncing when she skimmed across her nipples.

For a brief moment, I thought that I was dreaming when her left hand ran up her neck and into her hair as her right hand started tweaking her right nipple. I lost my control and spilled into her when she shouted my name as her orgasm ripped through her body. She rode me through our climaxes while her body milked me dry. I pried my fingers from the head board and wrapped them around her when she collapsed on top of me.

I had never felt this complete before. It was like she had opened up a part of me that I had kept locked away from every one. Including myself. I never wanted to leave this bed again. I never wanted to be away from her again. I sent a quick prayer to God that she felt the same way about me. I tightened my grip on her when I felt her try to move.

"Shower," she whispered in my ear.

I felt myself start to grow inside of her at the thought of a wet, naked Stephanie. She chuckled against my throat when I twitched. I slid out of her and carried her into the shower. We spent an hour in the shower torturing each other under the hot water. I couldn't get enough of her. By the look in her eyes, she felt the same way. I carefully dried her off as she dried me off. Both of us laughing and joking along the way.

I carried her back to the bed and fell on top of her as we sunk into a breath taking kiss. I made love to her. I had never done that with anyone before. There were soft caresses and pleasured moans that carried us through the night. We finally fell asleep tangled up in each other.

I awoke to open mouth kisses being trailed down my neck. A moan escaped my lips when I felt her mark the side of my throat. I felt like she was branding me and my heart soared. I ran my hands up her naked back and fisted them in her curls. I lightly tugged and got her to raise her head so that I could look into her beautiful eyes. I didn't mean for the words to slip out, but once they did every thing changed.

"I love you," I whispered.

Shock was written all over her face. I had said it too soon for her. I watched as her eyes showed several emotions before they settled on one. I felt my heart get stuck in my throat as I waited for her to speak. It seemed like time had stopped.

"I love you, too, Brett," she whispered and then crashed her lips down on mine.

I felt my heart soar back up into the air and I vowed to God that I would never let this woman go.


	14. Chapter 14

Disclaimer: JE owns the characters.

* * *

I saw the money pass between them and I chose to ignore it for the moment. I turned my attention back to the flaming pile of metal that use to be a car. I looked up at the tall man in blue that stopped next to me. He smiled down at me as he slipped his arm around my shoulder. I slipped my arm around his waist and pulled him back five feet. I knew that the gas tank hadn't blown yet. I liked Big Dog and didn't want to see him hurt by one of my minor catastrophes. Besides, it looked like he hit the jack pot this time.

Everyone around me started clapping and shouting as the gas tank blew.

"Aren't you a little worried?" Big Dog asked.

"Nope."

"Don't you think that he'll get mad?" he asked me as he looked around the area.

"I know that he's going to be mad," I said on a sigh when the firemen started spraying down the car. "It was a great car, too."

"That was a cherry car," Carl said as he came walking up. "I sure am glad that I'm not in your shoes. People have disappeared for shit less then this."

"I'm not going to disappear, Carl," I said in what I thought was a reassuring tone.

"Did you hear what he did a couple of months ago to that one guy?" Carl asked Big Dog over my head.

"Yeah," Big Dog said as he continued to scan the crowd that was forming. "You know that they still haven't found all of the body parts yet?"

"I heard yesterday that a foot washed up by the river over the weekend."

"I'm not going to be chopped up into pieces over a car," I said, more trying to reassure myself then them. I was starting to have doubts though.

"I sure hope so, Steph. That guy had only cut him off when he was driving down Haywood."

"No shit?" I asked as the first little wave of fear rolled through my gut.

"You know," Joe Juniak whispered in my ear from behind me. "I heard that he totally lost it when he was in the Rangers."

"What did you hear?" Big Dog asked.

"That he slaughtered a small group of militia over in Rwanda. I'm talking severed heads and limbs. I heard that they had to shoot him with enough tranquilizers to sedate five elephants," Juniak whispered.

We all silently contemplated how much it would actually take to tranquilize five elephants. An EMT came over and checked me out. He said that I was all clear other then the third degree burn on my right arm and some singed hair. I sighed at the thought of another trip to see Mr. Alexander. He wasn't going to be impressed.

"Then there was that guy two years ago," Big Dog whispered after the EMT left.

"Oh, Man! That was a mess!" Carl whispered back. "There was blood everywhere!"

"What are you talking about?" I asked as I started scanning the crowd with Big Dog.

"We found a guy hanging from the rafters in a warehouse," Juniak whispered. "He had been gutted."

"Ohmygod!" I whispered as my hand flew up to my mouth.

"We heard a rumor that he had said something bad about _you_," Carl whispered.

"Something about me?" I squeaked.

"What did they say that he said?" Carl asked Big Dog.

"It was a couple of weeks after that whole mess with the Slayers. The rumor mill said that this guy came in to Shorty's mouthing off. Said you should have died in that square after those guys had their way with you," Big Dog said as he looked down at me.

"There wasn't a trace of evidence in that whole building. Not one fiber or hair," Juniak whispered. "It was like smoke came in and killed that man."

"That can't be right," I whispered.

"It was the only thing that we ever heard about that guy," Carl said. We stood silently for a few moments and stared at the wreckage that sat in front of us before he started speaking again. "You know that all of the slayers started showing up in the river when they got bailed out?"

"I never heard that," I whispered as a shiver raced up my spine.

"We kept it out of the papers," Juniak whispered.

"You know that Ranger didn't kill Abruzzi, right?" Big Dog whispered in my ear.

I looked up at him and felt all of the blood drain out of my face. Oh. My. God. This was just so damn unexpected. I would have never thought that he would do that for me. He had always been so distant and cold. He probably hasn't said more then a dozen words to me since I met him four years ago. Why would he have done all of that? Did Ranger ask him to clean it all up?

"Oh, God! I killed his car!" I shouted in a whisper as I started franticly searching the crowd. "You have to get me out of here, Big Dog!"

"To late, Steph," Big dog said as he pointed to a black Bronco that stopped behind a fire truck.

"Carl," I said as I grabbed his arm, "Please. You have to call Joe and tell him 'good bye' for me. Tell my family that I love them. Tell Ranger that it wasn't his fault."

"I really don't think that he's going to hurt you, Steph," Carl said as he watched the owner of the latest vehicle that I have blown up climb out of the Bronco. "Remember that guy that washed up six months ago?"

"The one that had no hands or head?" Big Dog asked.

"Yeah," Carl whispered. "I heard this morning that they finally got an identification on him. He was last seen with the big guy over there."

"No shit?" Big Dog asked.

"Wait! What are you talking about?" I asked. I was so nervous now that I thought that I was going to throw up. "What body with no head?"

"They finally got an I.D. from one of his tattoos," Carl whispered.

We watched as the man that we had been talking about slowly made his way over to the remains of the 1970 Oldsmobile 442. My heart sunk as I watched him rub his hand across his forehead. His shoulders where slouched over. He ran his hand through his midnight black hair and turned around to face us. The blank expression on his face was something that I was use to. The troubling part was that I couldn't tell just how mad he was.

I tightened my grip on Carl as _he_ started walking over to us. Big Dog took two steps to his right, putting some distance between us. Carl held out as long as he could and then ripped his arm out of my hand at the very last second. I shot Carl a look over my shoulder that screamed 'TRAITOR'. I felt Juniak pat my shoulder before he ran for cover. If he didn't see anything, then he was in the clear.

I immediately looked down at my shoes as _he_ stopped right in front of me. I couldn't bring myself to look up at him. He had loved his car and I had destroyed it. I had a feeling that Big Dog and Carl were going to be fishing my body parts out of the river for the next few months. He brought his hand up and with the tip of his fingers, gently lifted my head so that I was looking up at him.

"Are you okay?" he whispered.

I couldn't find my voice, so I just nodded my head 'yes'. I watched as the eyes of the scariest man I have ever met start to water. I quickly found myself two feet in the air in a big bear hug. I wrapped my arms around his neck when he buried his face in my hair. I head onto him tightly and leaned my head against his. This frightening man was sniffling into my neck.

"I'm sorry about your car," I whispered.

"The car is just a piece of metal," he whispered in my ear. "I thought that you were gone."

"I really don't know what happened," I whispered as my hands started to shake as I thought about my close call. "I was just driving down the road and the back seat caught on fire."

I had just barely gotten out of the car on time. I burned my arm grabbing my purse before I jumped out while the car was still rolling down the street. It had been frightening to say the least. The flames came out of no where.

"You aren't mad?" I asked quietly.

"How could I be mad at you?" he chided as he sat me back down on the ground. "I'm just glad that you are okay."

"You know that this is the most that you've ever said to me at once," I said when he slipped an arm around me shoulders and steered me over to the Bronco.

"If you tell anyone," he said as he helped me into the Bronco, "They won't find your body."

"I was hoping that they might fish me out of the river," I joked with a big grin.

"Maybe they'll find you gutted in a warehouse."

"Ew!" I said as I scrunched my face.

"Steph," he said with a smile and a shake of his head.

"I really am sorry about your car, Hector."

"I know, Bomber. I know."


	15. Chapter 15

Disclaimer: JE owns the characters.

* * *

"It's not going to fit," I squeaked.

"Of course it will."

"What if something gets damaged?"

"It'll fit."

"What if it doesn't and one of us breaks something?" I asked as I felt panic start to bubble up in my stomach.

"We aren't going to break anything."

"Humor me," I pleaded. "Do you know someone that can fix it if we break it?"

"Yes. I do."

"But, you don't think that we'll break anything?" I asked.

"No, I don't. Can we do this now?"

"Hold on. I'm trying not to have a panic attack. Give me a moment," I said as I started to feel slightly dizzy about the topic at hand.

I swear that I saw his eyes roll as I bent over to put my head between my legs. I did some deep breathing to get my nerves under control. We had been talking about doing this for months. Now that we finally were, I was a bit nervous about actually _doing it_. I finally pulled my head back up and looked over at him.

"You know," he said, "it wouldn't look to good if you pasted out while we were doing this."

"I'm not going to pass out," I said with an eye roll of my own.

"You're a little worked up about this."

"It's a big deal. It's not every day that something like this happens."

"Thank God," he muttered.

"I heard that!" I shouted. "I can't believe that you just said that!"

I know that he was thinking about smiling at my outburst. His eyes were dancing around in his head as he watched me flail my arms as I continued my rant.

"I should have known that you would be insensitive about this! I wanted this to be special and you're turning it into a joke! I'm so glad that I let you talk me into this! What was I thinking?"

"You need to chillax."

"Chillax?" I shouted. "How can I chillax?"

"Deep breaths," he said flatly.

"I feel like my head is going to explode and he wants me to take deep breaths?" I shouted to the heavens. I'm not all that sure that God heard me. I decided to take out my new found rage over the silence from above on God. "I went to church every week for eighteen years and this is what you give me to work with?"

"Maybe he's mad about you missing the last seventeen years."

"Don't you start with me about church, Little Man!" I shouted as I glared over at him. "When was the last time you went to church for something other then a funeral?"

"It doesn't matter," he said with a dismissive wave of his hand. "I'd love to stand here all day while you try to prepare yourself for this, but I have a meeting in thirty minutes. Could we hurry this along?"

"Thirty minutes isn't enough time. I can't believe that you expected this to take less then forty-five minutes!"

"You're right," he said as he shook his head. "I should know by now that nothing is ever quick with you."

"You know what?" I said as I felt my temper start to rise. "Why don't you go ahead and go back to the office. I'll get one of the guys to help me out with this."

"Over my dead body," he growled as he stepped closer. "You wanted to do this together."

"But you don't seem to want to make the time for it," I pointed out as I took a step back and pulled out my phone. I knew just who to call to get a rise out of him.

"Don't you dare," he warned as he took another step forward as I started dialing.

I had the phone to my ear and waiting for the other end to answer when he caved. I watched him call the office and ask to have the meeting rescheduled. I snapped my phone shut before Lester picked up and dropped my phone back in my pocket.

"That's cold, Babe."

"You wanna know what's really cold? That I had to pen myself into my husbands daytimer to get time with him."

"I'm sorry that I've been busy, Babe."

"It's okay. Thanks for rescheduling for me, Ranger," I said as I smiled up at him. I slid my arm around his waist and turned his attention back to what brought us here in the first place. "I'm going to ask you one more time. Is there enough clearance to drive this Dodge Ram into the garage?"

"Yeah, Babe. Without breaking anything."

"Now I just need to pick a color," I said. More to myself then to him.

"Babe," he said with an exasperated sigh.

"Fine," I huffed as I turned to the car salesman who had been standing beside us the whole time. "I'll take one in black."

_

* * *

Chillax- Chill out and relax

* * *

_


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